Chosen
by Emmy the Writer
Summary: I was once told that humanity will always need heroes. Never, however, did I think that I'd fit the description. Nevertheless, here I am, up to my neck in lies and betrayals. And then there's those damn villains... and their irresistible Shizuru Viola...
1. Chapter 1

Sorry… I said I was leaving the Mai HiME section forever… but it just lures me back so badly! I was toying with some story ideas while reading comics (never a good thing to do…) and this sort of formed. I hope you enjoy, R&R and all that.

(Don't own Mai-HiME, btw)

Chosen

I was once told that humanity will always need heroes- without them, there is no hope, no safety net, no outstanding symbol of justice for the people to hold on to and keep close.

Though I live in a large city- Fuuka, to be exact- I had honestly not paid much attention to our heroes. I suppose I grew up as part of the conceited generation, dependant on these peacekeepers, unlike my parents; they didn't have masked men and women vigilantes. They had policemen. Policemen who did not have the knowledge or skills to deal with the rising waves of public-orientated villains, who had the idea to come out to humanity sooner than Heroes. No, they decided, something had to be done to stop the chaos caused by these monstrous antagonists- it was time for Heroity to bare themselves openly to the rest of the world.

Sure, there was chaos. I've read the old newspapers, seen the documentaries, and even listened to my parents' stories about what it was like to suddenly have heroes on the streets, living in the public eye. There was a fair amount of panic and prejudice- should these people have the right to vote? Should they be able to hold influential positions within the government? Were they dangerous?

Of course, that last question was obvious. Anyone with abilities beyond the norm is dangerous if they set these skills to dangerous things. That is the mentality of villains, though, not Heroes.

Speaking of Heroity, soon it came to transpire that the number of them must rise to compete with their foes, the villains, and to do this, they had to recruit. Millions became excited and scared in equal parts- would they be the next hero in their city? Nobody knew how the selection process worked, but quickly some criteria were deduced: you had to be physically fit, intelligent and gifted to start off with. Then, they'd take you to their headquarters and put you on trial, to see how you'd do. If- and that is a big if, mind- you were indeed suited to the job, _then_ you got a visit from Nagi Dái Artai, also known as Odin, giver of life, pillar of strength, etc, etc, ad nauseam. He was a young man and widely regarded amongst both humans and Heroes for his birthpower- to transform humans into heroes. He was the real authority figure amongst heroes, because without him… you weren't one. Usually, anyway.

Enough of the history lesson- though we have had a rather interesting history. This particular story begins on a dark August evening with a drunken college girl and a crowbar.

Nao usually left our window open- I mean, so did most people. Who would dare burgle anyone, especially at night, when you lived in our neighbourhood? Which, by the way, is in the catchment area of… go on. Guess. Oh, alright- just last week, Nao and me moved into an apartment in a district served by Diana.

You wouldn't have thought it, but I've seen one of her mirrors about. Patrolling the streets, they hover around, watching everyone. I'd think it was creepy, but Diana is one of the most benevolent heroes you've ever seen. She's a bit older than me, and mousy, with kind eyes and a soft voice, but when she gets passionate, she's like wildfire- like at Senator Wáng's press conference a few weeks back after the big gang bust. Damn, she is cool.

Anyway, the window- yes, we usually keep our windows unlocked, and Nao knew I was going out tonight, drinking. I had to celebrate something. It _was_ my birthday.

Grumbling, I stopped trying to get in that way and looked around for a house key. I didn't have mine on me, having left it on the kitchen table, nor did we keep any under flowerpots like middle-class families with houses big enough to create a sort of 'find-the-key' treasure hunt for their newly-responsible tweenaged offspring who come back twenty minutes late from gym.

I sighed, not finding anything. Nao slept with her mp3 player in, so she wouldn't hear me shouting. I was a bit drunk, too.

I heard a faint buzzing by my ear and moved by instinct to slap the bug away, even if it was a bit chilly for them till to be out. Instead of meeting air and/or bug, my hand met chilly metal and glass. Whirling around, I saw my own reflection staring back at me. Oh gods- it was a mirror! One of Diana's mirrors!

"Uh, I just forgot my key, my roommate is asleep…" I mumbled, making excuses for myself. I did not want to be on the receiving end of Diana's wroth. "So I'm trying to get back in."

The mirror nodded at me and sped off, and I briefly wondered if it had actually nodded, because you know, it _was_ a mirror, and they don't usually nod. Often, anyways. Worry settled in the pit of my stomach as I wondered if I was in trouble? Did the mirror think I had lied?

Twenty minutes later, I had a crowbar and was just about to start jimmying open the window when the buzzing sound joined me again. I looked at him (I had decided the mirror was a he) quizzically. "I still haven't managed to get in."

"Why are you telling that to a mirror?" A voice said out of the gloom and I looked up to see the fuzzy outline of a woman on the pavement.

"Uh," I scratched my head dumbly. "It might be 'cause I'm drunk?"

I felt her eyebrow rise mockingly. I damn _felt_ it, she was that contemptuous. I scowled through the gloom- my patent death-glare- but the figure was gone, now reappeared behind me setting a shadow over my window. An expertly landed kick in the shin sent me reeling, thudding down onto the concrete painfully. I cried out, but found another swift kick in the kidneys silenced me. "Obviously, there is a different reason you're outside a house at two o'clock with a crowbar."

"No!" I tired to explain myself. "Seriously, I need to get back inside. I live here."

She snorted. "You won't believe how many times I've heard that."

"Really!"

She obviously didn't believe me and I felt handcuffs around my wrists. "Shit! I didn't do anything! Let me go!"

"Yes, yes, and I'm the Queen of England." Diana rolled her eyes and forced me up, weirdly strong for such a skinny woman. "Tell it to the Chief."

The police? No. My eyes widened. I'm never in trouble with anyone, let alone the actual police. Bad girl image, but that was as far as I went with it- well, yes, I was a bit of a truant in my later years at high school too, but I've never broken the law. Speeding, I suppose, but not my fault. Having a motorbike is just too intoxicating.

At least I had time to get a good, close look at Diana. Neatly-ponytailed light brown hair under a dark-green mask. It would have been masquerade-like, but it was too practical. Twin contact lenses sparkled on her eyes, and her mouth was quirked in an amused half-grin. She was quite plain, if you looked at her with scrutiny, but nevertheless she was a part of heroity, and thus venerable. Not that I'm a worshipper/groupie or anything, I just totally understand the allure of this lifestyle.

This would be better if she was not dragging me to the police for trying to break into my own home, but it was still cool to meet a hero in the flesh.

Of course, Diana didn't have a car or anything human like that- one of her myriad of mirrors that flanked her at all times elongated and flattened into a platform big enough for the both of us to sit/stand on. She pushed me up onto it and then got on herself, silently guiding the hover-mirror up and over the streets. Oh my god! It was amazing- like flying. I had to grip onto the edges to stop myself falling to my untimely death. We whizzed past the traffic at the city centre (how there even is traffic at 2 a.m., I'll never quite work out) and landed in about four minutes at the massive while building that is Fuuka Police HQ. Since the villain threat had worsened, more money was being poured into defense and the constabulary had received a very nice new building, complete with on-site detention facilities and several connected hero specialists to help them with the more unruly criminals.

Diana escorted me quite courteously (though I myself had not forgotten that kidney shot) into the main atrium and nodded at the three women at the front desk. Many heads turned to look at her and I felt animosity hot on my back. Honestly, I hadn't actually done anything wrong!

"Diana." Deputy Wáng greeted her as we entered the Special Forces wing that deals with the more supernatural of Fuuka's lawbreakers. Tate Wáng was Senator Sergei Wáng's son- a rising star in the police force due to his quick-thinking and in-depth political knowhow. I disliked him, because we had gone to middle school together- he was three years older than me, but had always picked on me when I was younger. How he was all big and important, he had all the more reason to.

"I've got you a burglar." Diana told him nonchalantly, offering me up like a slab of meat in a butcher's shop. Tate looked at me, surprise starting to manifest on his face.

"Natsuki?" He asked me.

"Tate." I replied, almost growling at him. "I am not a burglar."

"Well, I've never seen you in the neighbourhood before and you were trying to jimmy open somebody's window with a crowbar." Diana pointed out slyly.

"That's because I just moved into your catchment area! Me and my roommate Nao Zhang- wait, you might have her under Juliet- but anyway, don't arrest me because I didn't do anything!"

"Whoa!" He replied, startled at my outburst. I'm sorry, but I did not plan on going to prison for a crime I didn't commit just as I'm about to finish college. No way. "Calm yourself down, Natsuki, and I'm sure we'll have this sorted out in time for you to collapse before sunrise."

Ah, Tate, always beautifully respectful. He ushered us over to his private office, motioning for me to take a seat. Diana stayed a while to give a description, but had to leave, presumably to save more windows from being irrevocably damaged due to drunken young adults trying to get home. Job, sweet job. Bitter? Me? Never.

"Well, it's a surprise to see you here." Tate started the conversation, rebooting his computer and shuffling some dastardly paperwork around. His in-tray seemed to be writhing and growing even as I looked at it, whereas the out-tray was sparse like a rationer's cupboard.

"I'd say likewise, but I knew you became a police officer."

"Tch. Famous am I?"

"No."

He frowned and then tapped away at the computer for a while. "Well, it does appear as though Diana has made a mistake. You and Miss Zhang are actually renting that apartment. Wait, Zhang? You're living with Nao?"

I grinned. He looked shocked. "Yes. Does it surprise you?"

"You two didn't get along well when I knew you. Catfighting."

"Tate, you were fifteen, I was thirteen. It's been a while to mature, hmm?"

He blushed and made a nasty face like the kid I knew he was. "I know. It's just odd, seeing the faces of my past in my present."

"Speaking of," I remembered. "How's Mai?"

He looked very disappointed all of a sudden and I felt I'd hit a sore point. "Ah, well, that didn't work out. She couldn't make time for me, and my job was just taking off- we didn't have the commitment to make it work."

Wow, they dated for, like, six years. Weird to think that Mai would break up with him. Then again, she'd opted out of going to college to pursue culinary excellence instead. The same for Tate, though he'd gone to police training, of course.

"So, what are you studying?" He asked, as if following my train of thought. Once, in my teens, I was known as the 'ice princess'- cold and steely and generally depressing. I got out of that phase, but I still come off a bit prickly on a bad day. Hormones have not stopped working their havoc on me, even now that I'm legal.

"Uh, I'm majoring in History, with a minor in Literature. My finals are coming up."

"I never pinned you as the essay type." He mused, looking curiously at a mug of coffee on his desk that he hadn't drank. "But then again, we all change."

"Indeed." I started getting fidgety. "Can I leave now?"

"Sure, just let me do this paperwork of a mistaken charge and you can sign it." He rummaged in his draws for the sheet. Finding it slightly crumpled, he filled it out with years of experience. "I do more paperwork that policing, I swear." It does feel like that sometimes. When I was applying for colleges, I had to fill out so many forms that I thought my hand would just die of boredom and drop off my wrist. "Sign here."

"Ah, could you undo these cuffs?" I realized I was still bound. He looked stricken. "Um, why do you look like you've forgotten to do your homework before a big test?"

"I don't have the key for those- they're Diana's special ones. Made for canceling powers and magic. She's the only one with the key."

Shit.

So around three hours later, I was at a bustop downtown with Tate getting odd looks. Looking at these people, you'd have thought they'd never seen a policeman and a woman in cuffs waiting for a bus before. Humanity these days, eh?

"Shame there isn't a giant flying mirror to take me home as well," I mused bitterly as the chill caused goosebumps to rise on my upper arms. Tate merely scowled. He didn't look like he was enjoying it much either. "So, you're with Spefo?" (For the uninformed, Spefo is a daringly linguistical twist on a shortening of the Special Forces Unit of the Fuuka Police.)

"Yes," he said a bit proudly. "Promoted last year- it's so damn interesting, but I can see why some people transfer out. It's understaffed and overstressed as it is, with all of the villains up to their shenanigans."

Oh my god. Did a twenty-four year old just say that villains were up to 'shenanigans'? That's like saying that sea monkeys are only slightly dull. A complete understatement. 'Tate, you're dealing with people who would rip your head off with a thought or a wiggle of their pinky finger, not a group of High Schoolers egging cars."

He shrugged. "We have to try. Heroity may be there most of the time, but they don't pick up their pieces. You saw Diana just now- dropped you off and left again. It does feel like we move closer to being a completely administrative body every day."

Was that regret in his voice? Wow, he had changed. Still, it doesn't change that these handcuffs won't come off unless we find that blasted mirror-hero. Or should I say heroine? When we talk about heroes as a group and race, they're always just heroity to our humanity, but if we have women and men, then they must have heroes and heroines, surely. I mean, Diana is definitely female. Biologically, heroes are a subtly different species than us, but they still appear mostly human. Is that for our benefit? If it weren't taboo to do so, would Diana perhaps look like a lizard-monster? I've stumbled across quite a random chain of thought.

"Tate, can heroes and humans interbreed?" I asked suddenly. He turned and blushed again, looking around. Most of the 5 a.m. commuters were nonexistent, so we had the place to ourselves.

"Yes," he replied. "Yes, they can, and the offspring will inherit the 'hero' gene from the parent on a dominant allele- but a hero usually has the Hh gene, where the big H is the hero gene. So if they make a child with a human, there's a 50:50 chance that the offspring will be one also."

"Do you have to learn about that kind of thing for your job?"

"It does come up. For instance, hero children tend to… well, think of your average destructive toddler, then imagine then breathing fire."

I almost laughed at that. Fire-breathing babies may seem ridiculous, but such things do happen. Ah, the bus has finally arrived. Only took you half an hour, mate. It's freezing- or is that just me? Tate paid my fare and we boarded, sitting near the front. The bus driver leered at my cuffs and then at Tate in his uniform and gave me a look saying 'you've been a very bad little girl, haven't you?' Damn humans, always quick to judge, we are.

The bus takes the roundabout route back to the park near my flat, so we had to wait pretty much the whole ride. Tate didn't make conversation, only yawning and checking his phone occasionally. We didn't see Diana, and I had the increasingly dreadful feeling that I was going to have to wear these handcuffs for even longer. They were chaffing

something horrible and my wrists were raw. Well, I thought, irritated- this is the godly retribution you get for trying to break into your home.

"Last stop!" the driver shouted, painfully loud against my ears. He should watch his decibels. Tate and I got off and he walked me back to the flat, pulling out his police-grade lock-picker. Our door, being like any other door, yielded to the techy device in a matter of seconds.

Inside smelled of deodorant and pizza- Nao and I are both notorious slobs, though I'm slightly better- I at least organize my underwear collection. I welcomed Tate in for a quick drink but he declined, saying his next shift was starting in three hours and he wanted a nap. I thanked him, actually quite, well, thankful. He'd been helpful and informative. I suppose people really can grow up.

Yawning, I stumbled back to my bedroom- opposite Nao's- leaving a trail of clothes in my wake. I couldn't really do anything about my top half, but at least I was reduced to a pair of pyjama trousers that weren't dusty. I looked at the clock, feeling slightly mournful, and wished myself a happy 22nd birthday before falling into a deep, dreamless sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

Thank you all of the positive feedback just in, like a day. I decided to put the second chapter up quickly so as to keep the story moving along. Remember to R&R!

Chosen

Chapter 2

It was well past midday when I awoke, head throbbing in time with my heart, mouth dry and tongue swollen. My side hurt like hell where Diana had kicked me and I made a mental note to see a doctor if it got worse. Hobbling like an old man, I made my way out of bed and into the kitchen to make some kind of token meal. Nao was in the living room, watching Jeremy Kyle in her shorts and tank top. What a glamourous life we lead.

"Morning, sleeping beauty." She said mockingly, getting off her ass to join me in the kitchen. "Why're you hobbling around like a pensioner?"

"Long story." I said exasperatedly, wondering how to get the milk out of the fridge. "Nao, could you take the milk out of the fridge?"

"Do it yourself, lazy-arse." She retorted, even though she was in the fridge herself. She turned to look at me strangely. "Why do you have your hands behind your back, Kruger?"

I blushed, embarrassed, and turned around. I couldn't see Nao's expression, but by the barking, spluttering laughter that erupted behind me I knew she must find this hilarious. I turned back to see her leaning against the wall, almost crying, giggling hysterically. "Oh god, what did you do last night?"

"Not what you're thinking." I replied sharply. Nao may be a close friend of mine, but I know her quite well and she has certain tastes when it comes to the activities of the bedroom. It begins with s- and ends with -adist. Not that I mind, as long as it doesn't ever find it's way over to my side of the hallway. "I got arrested. By Diana."

Her eyes widened. "Seriously? What were you doing, poking an innocent kitten with a stick?"

"No, I was trying to break back in here at 2 a.m. Something about a young adult with a crowbar at a window seems to be suspicious to the authorities."

"Why do you still have them on?"

"Memento." I replied sarcastically. "What do you think? She dumped me at the police station and never unlocked them."

Nao looked half excited, half pissing herself laughing. "Of all the people, Kruger… oh, happy birthday."

She surprised me by handing over a small, nicely wrapped present. I carefully opened it, albeit backwards since my hands were cuffed behind my back, expecting a can of squirty cream to explode or something, but it turned out to be a very nice alarm clock in the shape of a penguin. "Wow. Actually, properly thanks, Nao. I wasn't expecting much."

"Don't mention it. The only thing you get from your parents any more is a cheque in the post and the occasional postcard from an exotic place, so I thought you might be bereft of presents this year."

Aw, sweet. She's right, though- about my parents. They retired just before I left high school and decided that they'd spent ten years and a chunk of the family fortune to travel around the entire world, writing a couple of books about it to make more cash as they went along. So far, they'd been very successful, but I did miss the contact. A postcard from Bahrain makes not a family.

I scurried off to my room to finally replace my cheapie 80's throwaway alarm that didn't even play the radio. It was then when I felt a sudden buzzing in my room- a buzzing that reminded me of Diana's mirrors. I looked around. Nothing was there, except the mirror hanging above my dresser. I looked at it suspiciously, walking over and peering at my reflection. Nothing new, except an unamused graze on my forehead where I'd fallen last night.

Behind me, hands grabbed my wrists and I jumped out of my skin, twisting and thrashing the assailant off me. "Hold still!"

Diana stood there, looking annoyed and slightly apologetic. "Have you come to remove the handcuffs, or would you rather beat me up again?" I said snidely, never one to avoid a confrontation.

"I'm sorry." She said meekly- nothing like the powerful independent Diana that the public know as their hero(ine?). The sudden change shocked me and I shut up for a second. "I completely forgot that nobody else has the key."

I frowned by said nothing, turning around for her to undo my bindings. They clicked undone and the skin on my wrists sang a hymn of relief as they were freed from their weight. "Thanks." I said awkwardly. There was a hero in my room.

"No, I'm sorry in the first place… even heroes make mistakes, but it shouldn't discomfort those we watch over."

Nice, much? "Seriously, it's okay." I may be bitter inside, but I forget a grudge relatively quickly. Heroes make human mistakes all the time. For instance, that one a few cities over who died of alcohol poisoning in a drinking game. Idiot, but human mistake.

"Ah, well, I'm glad we sorted that out." She replied, looking around my room curiously. "So, you live here?"

I nearly (read: was about to) said something sarcastic, but didn't fancy another placement at the end of her boot, so I bit my tongue. "Uh, yeh. Me and my roommate, Nao."

"Renting?"

"For the moment, yes. When we finish college, we're going separate ways."

"Ah, I see." She hummed to herself. "What do you think of heroes?"

"I prefer then when they don't beat me up," I said before I could stop, but she smiled weakly. Okay, I'm over it. Move along, folks, nothing to see here. "But in general I think they do a lot of good. I've never really known a time when they weren't protecting us, actually."

Diana laughed, a nice sound that was soft against the ears. "That's good to hear. We do our best." Her face set in a more serious tone, and the atmosphere changed to become secretive and businesslike very suddenly. I had always been amazed by how much influence heroes had over the mood of humans. "Listen, other than to undo those cuffs, there's another reason I'm here."

Oh. My mouth stopped mid-surprised expression. Diana, here on an ulterior motive? Why did this have to happen while I have a hangover? Unsmiley face. She took a deep breath.

"After the incident last night, Asgard has reviewed your portfolio and finds you a viable candidate for ascent to heroity. We would like to invite you to attend an exam on August twenty-second to assess your candidacy."

Holy shit.

I watched the number of miles remaining display on the treadmill blink from five to four, mind blank and eyes set on the television ahead, which was playing a music channel on which some idiot was dancing badly. Still, it was better than thinking. Thinking only made my head hurt.

If I could say the f word, I would. Eff, Eff, Effing hell. I'm a candidate for heroity. That was so out of the blue that I'd never have even thought it. I mean, I fit the criteria, but still, the usual ones are public heroes- firefighters, nurses, that sort. Not third year History students at Fuuka University. I mean… it's hardly even thinkable. Me, Nastuki Kruger, a hero? I don't have the developed and contrived sense of moral justice for it. And there is no way I'd wear a silly outfit.

Still, though it was tempting. Who refuses and offer from Asgard? Of all the places I thought I'd get to see, the inside of an Asgard base was not one of them. If my parents were still in frequent contact, they'd have kittens. Literally.

I looked down at my legs, pumping away on the rubber of the treadmill. Could these really be the legs of a hero? And then, there was all that to consider. Was it… painful? 'Ascending', as Diana had called it? If I became a hero, I'd no longer be human. That was frightening; I've been human for twenty-two years and not thought a thing of it. To change species- because heroes were a separate species to humans- was just impossible, even though I'd grown up with people protecting me who'd done exactly the same thing.

A little guiltily, perhaps, I was very excited and had already decided to go to the exam. It was only a week and a day until the date that Diana had said- I'd need to push my fitness further, and get ahead in my studies. I had a paper on the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931 to complete, as well as some books to read. And then there were finals! There just wasn't enough time to be a hero.

What am I saying? If I became a hero, finals would hardly matter. I'd be thwarting criminal arms rackets and that sort of thing. Compared to that, who cares about the Thatcherite Economic Miracle when you're saving children from kidnappers?

Okay, I'm getting ahead of myself. I said I'd stop thinking and just run, but I just got into more of a mess. Did Diana know just how this news affects humans?

Before I knew it, I'd done the last four miles and the speed slowed into cooldown. Wiping sweat from my brow, I took a long gulp of water and looked around at the other people in the gym. Since the realization that being fit helped you out in the recruitment of heroes, gym membership and attendance had doubled, then trebled and others saw their peers getting into shape and didn't want to look the odd one out. It was another good side effect of the grand heroic coming-out.

They were a mixed bunch, with a few more men than women, but it was still quite full. I was glad that I got my gym membership subsidized as part of Fuuka Uni's Get Fit Stay Fit program, where students were encouraged to exercise. When I left, I would be so skint.

After gym, it was time to shop- I got out after showering and changing at about four, so I had plenty of time to do a quick round of groceries. Nao and I shared household expenses, and did the food shop on alternate Tuesdays, because neither of us had lectures on those days. It was nice, being at college- so much freedom. My schedule was suspiciously tailored to the fact that I deplore waking up early, so most of my classes were in the afternoons, with only a Literature lecture on a Monday at 8 a.m. sharp to dampen my spirits.

You win some, you lose some.

Nao was out when I got back, so I turned the telly on while putting away the groceries. The news was always interesting, so I tuned onto it and listened.

"_And this just in: the two masked villains known as the Masques have been captured and incarcerated by Fuuka authorities today. The duo, who performed an unchallenged streak of seven bank robberies earlier this year, were tracked to their hideout in a salmon packaging plant just outside of town. Akane Soir reports from the scene._"

A female voice took over. "_Thank you in the studio. I'm here at Fuuka Fishery, and as you can see behind me, there is a crater the size of a carpark outside. The direct cause of this is unknown, but we suspect it is a previously unknown hero acting without Asgard as a real vigilante. While the Masques managed to escape, they were seized by Fuuka authorities while fleeing the scene. The identity of the hero who damaged this site so badly is unknown, and both the Special Forces and Asgard are on the look out for this potentially dangerous hero… or villain?_"

Wow. A crater. That is some power… It does kind of make you feel small, as a human in a world where people with his kind of destructive capability exist.

The door banged open and Nao walked in, flustered, and slammed some notes on the table. "Here's rent." She said, making a beeline for the fridge and smiling when she saw that it was filled. "Good workout?"

"Uh, same as always, I suppose." I replied nonchalantly. I'd thought of telling Nao about my impending exam but had decided against it. She'd go crazy. Nao didn't like heroes- her mother was in hospital in a coma after being caught in between a villain and a hero in a holdup. My red-haired roommate had a seething hatred for the people who'd done this to her mum, and wanted nothing better than all of heroity to go back into hiding so the world was nice and normal again. Even worse, she was very informed about the subject, so she could argue her points well- she was majoring in politics, with a minor in current affairs, which basically was the study of heroes and villains. She could name most of the ones in the city, and some from the surrounding towns, too.

She gave me a strange look and disappeared back into her room with a packet of crisps and a coke, probably to surf the web. Dutifully, I tidied the flat a bit and sorted through the mail- bills and crap mostly, so I took out our pot of money and relegated notes to various envelopes- heating, lighting, internet, television license, my insurance (Nao didn't drive) and various other utilities. Since moving out of the halls of residence, money seemed to always be tight, especially when I already held a student loan. Sure, my parents sent a wad of money every now and then that pretty much covered my living expenses, but that didn't leave much left for my own personal use. Do you know how long it takes to save up for a motorbike?

The week passed, for me anyway, in a flurry of activity. I abused my gym membership, going every day, working myself into the ground. Nao actually once asked whether I was okay, which was an indicator that I really was looking haggard. I did about six essays, working late into the night, and informed my professor that I'd be absent from her lecture on the twenty-second. As long as I caught up, she said, I'd be fine. Well, she looked a lot more receptive to me taking the time off when I handed her two papers that weren't due for another week.

On Sunday night, I was about to slide into bed when a slip of paper wafted if through my window. Curious, I grabbed for it and saw that something was written on it.

_Dear Candidate,  
You will be received at six-thirty p.m. sharp at Linden Baum Café and Restaurant, 43 Eighth Street. Your contact will be identified by the green pennant on her left lapel, and will instruct you further as the time arrives.  
Yours hopefully,  
Odin_

Holy mother of Ug. I clutched the paper in my hands, nearly shaking. It was handwritten, and I was holding a note from Odin. _The_ Odin, the one in charged of all of heroity. Nobody has seen him publicly since the one speech he made in which he outed heroity to humanity. Oh my god.

Like a giddy highschooler, I tucked the note safely away in my draw, having already memorized it, and got into bed, almost too excited to sleep. Call me a fangirl, but…

When I did fall into sleep, I remember what I dreamt about vividly. I was standing in the mist, on top of a green hill, the kind that are common in the countryside surrounding Fuuka, though I could see far through the impenetrable bank of fog that nipped at my ankles. I was walking to a ruined church, on the very top of the hill, carrying the haze with me, heavy weight of a gun on my hip. Why I had a gun, I don't remember. At the top, I pushed back a splintered wooden door, looking for someone. Someone I know should be here, I thought strangely. I have memories made in this place, but I can't for the life of me remember what they're of. Something big, something important. I stepped over the shattered remains of the church-bell, and a pang of emotion hit my stomach. Constricting tendrils, pulling me over to the other side of the room. A warm embrace. A hand in my hair.

It's all too real. I used to have terrible nightmares when I was younger, and I developed a way to get out of them. This one, though… it's not like the others. I'm not in it- I can't affect anything, like a ghost merely observing. I can't punch the walls to wake myself up. This is my life- part of it anyway. The future, maybe, or some past I don't remember. That kind of notion is silly, because my life has been relatively normal so far. And I don't… well; I do remember this place, in a way. I've been here before, but not currently, if that makes sense. I will go here.

I opened my eyes to stare at my new penguin clock. It was 06:59, one minute before it woke me up and turned the radio on. Weird. My body wanted to stay in bed, but I was too creeped out by the dream to remain still. So, I slithered out of bed and stretched, feeling my muscles ache a bit, tense, and then relax. As today was a special day, I decided to dress nicely, unlike my usual jeans and shirt combo. I had tree lectures today- Literature in the morning, then two history in the afternoon, the later one, which ran from five to seven, I was missing because of my appointment.

I'm not vain enough to have a full-length mirror, unlike Nao, so I pottered around for a bit, choosing underwear, which always takes me a while due to my expansive collection. Once I had decided on black and frilly (always safe), I rummaged around my wardrobe for some nice clothes. I had two suits, one with a skirt and the other with trousers, but they were a little formal. In the end, I went with some slacks, but ones with a crease ironed onto them, and a light blue fitted blouse. I'm not the cardigan type, but it was cold. In the end I decided on just my coat.

The radio popped on somewhere in the middle of this process and I half-heartedly listened to the breakfast show while I brushed my hair. I had showered the night before. By the time I was done, it was ten to eight and I had to grab a croissant from the breadbasket instead of making a proper breakfast, shoving it in my bag and hopping onto my bike. Nothing to wake you up like weaving through Fuuka traffic at eight a.m.

"Watch it!" a man shouted from a truck as I passed him on the inside, speeding up to overtake. His fault he's so slow to be honest. I have a lecture to get to. Fuuka Uni's campus was just off-centre of town and sprawled over the residential area of the city, assimilating houses as it had grown in prestige and size. I skidded to a halt in front of the Humanities building and chained my bike, munching on my croissant as I swankily entered the building through the double-doors. Not many people took Lit, especially not this course that had such a strict professor. But, hey, I liked Dr. Sakomizu. He was short and podgy, but friendly if you didn't skip his lectures. He also knew his stuff.

I scuttled into his class, early by a couple of minutes, and sat down near the back, pulling my books out of my bag. Despite the early hour, I wasn't sleepy, too psyched for tonight.

"Hey." I heard a familiar voice by my side and turned. Takeda was, as usual, taking his place beside me. I liked him a bit, but he does ask me out a lot and I'm not really into him. Still, he's nice, and I'm mature enough to be his friend. Well, unless he does something stupid like the time I accidentally ran off with his copy of the set text and he came into the girls changing rooms to get it back. Pervert.

"Morning," I said, trying convincingly to yawn. I watched him rummage around in his bag for a bit before producing a small present.

"I'm sorry that I didn't get to give this to you earlier last week, but some stuff came up." He offered me the present and I unwrapped it eagerly, thankful that at least some people remembered that I was getting one year closer to dying. Call me a pessimist, but birthdays are a sore point with me. Takeda's gift was actually pretty cool- his Dad ran Fuuka Kendo Club (internationally ranked, I'll have you know) but he had four other brothers, one of whom ran a specialty electronics and hardware company. I marveled at the gadget- a handsfree headset for my phone that would fit into my motorcycle helmet without squashing my ear. Coolio.

"Thanks." I said to him. He beamed and smiled like a lovesick puppy. It was quite sad, that I didn't like him back, but you couldn't help admiring his persistence. Since high school, he'd been trying to woo me. Poor lad. "You didn't have to."

"No, I did. I know that you didn't get any presents last year, so I thought that I could at least get you one this time around."

"Aw, Takeda. That's really sweet of you." I smiled. Okay, I was leading him on. I used to be very, very cool and distant from people, but that changed when I entered college. I realized that being liked from close-up is better than being feared and idolized from afar. You could say I went soft. Or that I grew up. Either way, thankfully, I'm not a studmuffin any more.

He blushed and mumbled something that I didn't quite catch and ducked under the desk to get his books our. People were coming in now, chatting about their weekends. A big topic for conversation was the incident with the crater from earlier, as well as some smaller bust-ups. There was a rumour that Rad had been spotted on Saturday night, but I dismissed it as unlikely. As one of the most prominent and powerful villains in Fuuka, Rad usually commands the others, to a point. I've seen one clip of him, about ten years ago, caught by a very lucky cameraman. He looks straight into the camera- well, you think he does, since his massive grey helmet covers his face. At least that's what it looks like. The cameraman then mysteriously collapses and the camera hits the floor and films fifty minutes of rubble in a destroyed street.

Had the crater been caused by Rad? Just a theory.

"Goooood morning, happy campers!" Prof. Sakomizu said in his booming voice. "I trust you've all got your papers for me?"

A few groans of people who hadn't done them replied, but Sakomizu didn't lose his peppy attitude. "Allrighty, then. We're halfway through your last semester. Your finals are coming up, and we haven't got long to cover the last part of the reading material. So, today we're doing Chapter Twelve in-depth, and I'll expect the notes in essay form. You pick the question, but do it well. Two thousand words."

He was always like this. In a way, I liked it, because it allowed me to write myself a question I'd do well at, but the amount of work was still annoying.

Anyway, we discussed chapter twelve in depth, and then I hung out in the student lounge. I had lunch and went to my History lecture. Nothing out of the ordinary, but all through the day, my sense of foreboding and excitement was slowly growing until I nearly wet myself when I got home at about four fifteen, so anxious was I. Nao didn't help by coming home a bit later and looking at me disapprovingly.

"Skipping?"

"Yeh." I lied slightly guiltily. "Prof. Graceburt can live without me for two hours." I'd actually got permission from that dour old woman to skip her class. A nearly perfect attendance record made that possible- I had realized that truancy does not breed kind relations with teachers in high school. I even had to repeat a year, which is why Nao and I are in the same year, even though she's a year younger.

I set about does those little nitpicking things that you usually do before important events or dates. You know- I showered a blow-dried my hair, moisturized, shaved, etc. It seemed wrong to change back into my day clothes, so somewhat awkwardly I reverted to some nice blue jeans, but with the same shirt from the morning.

Time ticked by inexorably slowly, and I was finished by five fifteen. I decided to take the bus to the Café, since I didn't know where we'd be going afterwards. Looking regretfully back at my bike, I left the house at half past and ambled to the bus stop. It was too weird to be doing this, especially on a Monday. I paid my fare and the bus driver leered at me, expecting to see handcuffs again. Damn, he was never going to let me live that down, was he?

Linden Baum was a large eatery with bright pink and white decoration. It looked studenty, but I'd never been there before. I'm not a fan of cafés, really. They're expensive and I don't have the friends necessary to meet at one. Sad. Nervously, I pushed the door open to the wafting smell of pastry, looking around. The interior was snug, with booths separating tables and red seats. I searched for the woman with a green badge on her lapel, but couldn't find her. I looked at my phone, the display reading 18:22. Okay, I was a bit early. I could wait.

I sat down and a perky waitress came up to take my order. If you ask me, she was looking at me almost suspiciously, but hey, I suppose some college students can be a nuisance. I ordered some bottled water to keep her quiet, scanning the restaurant.

A woman came out of the toilet and I immediately knew that she was the one. Small green pin on her left lapel, shaped like a lucky shamrock. She was tall and athletically built; with dull brown- you'd say it was grey- hair and golden eyes behind trendy glasses. She noticed me and smiled slightly, walking over. Her business suit was impeccable, and I wondered if she actually had just gotten changed.

She sat down opposite me. "You're the latest, you know."

I looked at her skeptically. "It's not even half past yet."

"The others got here before six. Slightly keen of them, don't you think?"

I frowned. "Yes. I have college."

"Ah." She looked at me over her glasses. "So, shall we go?"

"Where?"

"Follow me."

"Wait!" I said loudly. "I haven't paid for my drink."

"Forget it. Just come." She stood up and left the table, heading towards the door marked toilets- I swear she'd just come from there. Dubious, I followed. She entered the door, which branched out into ladies,' men's, disabled, and one unmarked door. She took a key out of her pocket and unlocked it. It swung open, revealing steps downwards. Ushering me in, she then shut and locked the door behind us. After this door was another, high-tech one that she scanned her iris at. It opened like something off Star Trek to a large underground room with a small central platform. It could have been a train station.

Three other people were waiting on the platform, looking scared and a bit annoyed. They looked at me warily, as if accusing me of being late (I wasn't).

"Well, that's the lot. If you'd get on the platform, we can move out to Asgard." I stepped from the side onto the platform, seeing that there was nowhere to sit or buckle ourselves in. The woman pressed some buttons on a control panel and then jumped on herself just as it started moving, quite slowly at first, but it sped up. We entered a low tunnel and increased in speed; so I sat down to avoid falling over and probably killing myself. The woman took up a position at the front and looked at us appraisingly.

"Well, welcome to the underground transport network of Asgard. My name is Chie Hallard, and I will be your supervisor for the duration of your visit. Please note that you are to follow me at all times and obey everything I say." She looked at them, scrutinizing their appearance. "You have all been subject to unforgiving background checks, but there is always room for error. Note that if you attempt anything that we see as threatening, you will be arrested. Or worse, depending on who is there at the time."

Ouch. These guys were serious. I looked to my sides at the other candidates. They looked similarly tough and mentally prepared for whatever was ahead, and I was sort of secretly hoping that it was not too arduous. I was the only woman, I noted somewhat smugly. That's right, boys: Kruger will take you down. Rawr.

My thoughts seemed to be getting a little silly, so I collected myself to listen to what Chie had to say next.

"When we arrive at Fuuka Asgard Base, you will begin a twenty-four hour examination. If at any time you consider yourself close to death, you will each be given a bracelet to press. You will be rescued and then eliminated from candidacy. Should you pass, deliberation will be made afterwards."

Close to death?


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Here's chapter 3- it was a biatch to write. Hopefully, though it explains some things and foreshadows others. Still getting the hang of first-person, so excuse ay random tense changes.

Chapter 3

It's cold. No, scrap that, it's actually around minus twenty-six. I know, because I've been glancing over at the thermometer for the last hour.

We're in a room, but we aren't allowed within three metres of each other. They think we'll share warmth, or something. It's been getting steadily colder in this room and already the idiot who sat down had got some frostbite. I have a system- rest for a minute, jumping jacks for thirty seconds, repeat to stay warm and keep energy up. The others copied me what they realized that they couldn't feel their fingers. There are cameras around the room, and we have another hour to spend in here. And the thermometer just crept over to minus thirty.

Damn.

"So." One of the others said amiably. "Where's everyone from?"

I didn't really want to talk, but being in a freezing room was really boring. The man on the floor had passed out and I thought I should go and help him, but it turned out that he was listening to everything, just playing dead. Weird.

"I'm doing a internship at Fuuka Hospital." One said. He was tall and lanky, just short of athletic, with a mop of greasy dark brown hair. "I'm a pharmacist."

"Ah, I know the place. I'm a mechanic." The one who'd asked everyone where they were from said. "What about you?"

The question was directed at me, so I reluctantly relinquished my information. "I major in History at Fuuka Uni."

This obviously made me uninteresting, so mechanic went back to talking with the pharmacist. I looked at the thermometer, seeing the temperature creeping just shy of minus thirty-five. It was getting quite cold by now, my teeth starting to chatter. It was now thirty seconds of jumping jacks and thirty seconds of rest. Mechanic's muscles helped him ward off some one the cold, but his nose and ears were a dangerous red. You know, I did mention it briefly before, but I do feel as though Big Brother is watching me.

Conversation had drifted onto politics. Mechanic had said something about heroes in government, and pharmacist had disagreed with him. The argument was becoming heated when, oddly, the rest of the room did. My body felt strange, and I realized that the whole room was heating up, and fast, too. Now, I haven't done biology since high school, but I know you're not supposed to heat something from frozen very quickly. You have to let it defrost.

The temperature shot up to zero and began to climb. The others noticed it, too, and looked around, alarmed. I was nearest the door, but it had no inside handles.

Hazardously quickly, I began to sweat. Not caring about the fact that there were four other men in here, I stripped to my underwear. The walls, previously coated with ice, were melting and I wanted a drink before it got too hot. I was the only one with a clear head, I remember, the others were scrambling about. Don't move too much, idiots. It's really hot.

"What the hell!" the Mechanic said, sweat pouring down his meaty head. "It's damn hot!"

"No shit, Sherlock." The pharmacist said snidely. "What do we do?"

"How should I know?"

They continued arguing. The man playing dead hadn't moved, and a realized that he'd actually been clever- letting his body temperature drop so that if the climate suddenly changed, he'd take longer to start overheating. Damn, and I though I had the good ideas.

I let the dripping water saturate my shirt so that I could wring it and drink if I got parched. The air began to humidify and the thermometer rose.

Maybe twenty minutes later, the bulky mechanic collapsed. We all stared at him, wondering what we should do. Thinking like a candidate, I reckoned that saving him was the heroic thing to do, but I couldn't go within three metres of him. The pharmacist looked at me. "Should we…?"

"We're not allowed."

"Still, if he can't press his own bracelet… he can't call for help."

I looked again at the body. "They are watching us. They'll come if he's in trouble."

"How will they know?"

I bit my lip. I didn't actually know if they had a way of knowing whether he was merely unconscious or actually dead. "Well, we should keep our cool now. If his breathing becomes laboured, we'll break the rule and call for help. To be honest…" I sucked in a breath of humid air. "If sticking to the rule means that someone dies, I don't want to."

He nodded in agreement and we appointed ourselves to watch over him, since the other man was busy being smart and playing dead.

I sighed with relief as the door slid open an hour later. Two men in grey uniforms with a stretcher carried the mechanic out. Presumably, he'd failed. I felt a little guilty, but only very little. This was, after all, a competition.

Chie escorted us from the climate room to a large gymnasium. Thankfully, I was given new clothes to wear- underwear does not bode well for a trip to the gym. It consisted of a pair of tracksuit bottoms in grey and a white, unmarked t-shirt. The fact that they knew my size didn't really disturb me. I mean, this was Asgard.

Speaking of, I'd expected… I don't know, roman architecture and babbling brooks and everything in gold leaf. I'd done Ancient European History as an option in my second year, so I'd covered the Norse Mythology Spectrum. Asgard, ruled by Odin. I was just looking for the valkyries and carrying flagons of mead to dead warriors. Or was that Valhalla? Damn, I needed to revise. Needless to say, Asgard was a bit under par compared to my expectations.

"Natsuki." She called me by my first name. Weird. I looked at Chie, who was looking down her nose at a clipboard. "Proceed to platform 2."

Where? Ah, there was a big '2' on the wall by a slightly raised and matted space for sparring. Damn, I haven't done martial arts since I was a kid. This would be epic fail. I got up on the battleground and the pharmacist and the playing-dead guy came up on the opposite side. Two against one? Not cool. They looked as though they'd been told what to do already.

A man came to referee. He gave the order, and the fight started. They both sprung at me, thinking to use their height and weight to their advantage. Never one to back down, I ducked out of the way of blundering Pharmacist's gangly arms and did what any woman under duress would- I kicked him hard in the privates. He squealed and toppled over, clutching his manhood. The one who played dead had to change his attack style- he no longer had the other man to distract me. He fired a kick at my chest, clumsy and too high- it upset his centre of balance, so I took the opportunity to block the kick and flung it up in the air, sending him backwards. I may not take classes, but self-defense has always come instinctively to me. Sure, I may use slightly underhanded tactics, but in the end it produces the desired result.

Pharmacist was about to recover, and Dead-Guy was scrambling back up. Was this honourable combat? I mean; could I get them while they were down? It didn't seem right, so I let them recover. Pharm got up first and punched low, so I skidded out of the way, only to meet his leg. I toppled over, my arm bruising to take the impact of my fall. Ouch.

I stood back up and eyed the two of them, who were circling me. One had to be weaker, who I could take out first, and then deal with the stronger one. I decided to get rid of Pharm first, because he was stringy and didn't have the same bulk and muscle of Dead-Guy; I got closer to him. They both attacked at once, from my right and left, so I ducked and headbutted Pharm in the shins. It hurt my head, but put him off balance. I'm not proud of what I did next. I grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and punched him square in the jaw, and then again, and again, until his head lollopped uselessly on his shoulders. He was heavy, so I dropped him and concentrated on Dead-Guy, who had been watching with horror and not doing anything. Hell, he could have tackled me down while I was concentrating, but I don't think he'd ever seen a girl be quite so violent before.

Nothing indicated we should stop, so he sized each other up. He was more cautious now, seeing his unconscious teammate being pulled off the platform by two more men in grey. He ran towards me and aimed high, but then feigned low, so I started ducking but met his fist in my gut. Pain blossomed in my stomach and I staggered backwards. He used this to throw two punches, first to my jaw and then to my collarbone, which very early snapped under the force.

He finished with a kick to the knee and I went down, sprawled out on the floor. I moved to get up, feeling vicious, but his foot was pressing into my back, hard.

I brought my arm around uncomfortably and grabbed his ankle, pushing with all my might. He was caught slightly off-balance and I used the opportunity to buck him off, trying to roll over, instead bringing him down with me. I knew I couldn't win on the floor- he was too strong.

Grunting, I kneed his stomach and tried to force his head to the side so he couldn't see, but he brought a hand that dragged my thigh to the side and made my grab fall short of the neck. He then rolled onto me, panting and sweating like a stallion, but hesitated when faced with my pretty little features. Idiot. I brought my face up as though to kiss him but instead bit down hard on his nose, which spurted blood all over me. Gross.

He howled in pain and his hand left my side to cover the bite. I slid out from under him and brought both my elbows down on his lower back with massive force in a purely primeval move that must have hurt like hell. He flopped and sagged, shouting in pain. I kicked him in the side, like Diana had done to me last week, and then backed off.

"Hold!" the referee said, and two more attendants, grabbed my arms and pulled me back to the other side of the platform. Feeling like I was being restrained like a lunatic, I shrugged them off and regained my breath- deep gulps of air. Shit, I hadn't known that I had that in me. The fight was already some sort of out of body experience that couldn't have been me at the reins. I felt feral and thuggish, to have just beaten up a grown man.

With a signal from the ref, I was escorted off and led into a small changing room where I was given a change of clothes- the same ones as I was wearing now, but clean. There was no shower, so I made do with water from the sink. All flushed red and bruised; I cleaned up and exited, feeling the soft cotton on my skin. Chie was waiting and wordlessly led me to a completely different section of Asgard- this was more like in the myths. The corridors were wood-paneled and carpeted, though there was evidence of high technology (á la sliding doors) all around.

And exam. I had thought this was going to be purely physical stuff, but I was sat down on a desk with required equipment and given a paper. Several papers, actually. Chie said I had six hours to do them all. Frantic, I looked. Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Human Biology, Literature, Humanities and another one labeled 'Asgard Syllabus' that I decided to do last.

After high school, I changed from a delinquent with a poor attendance record to a young woman entering university with a relatively clean slate, so I decided to make use of it. My History teacher, Ms. 'Call me Midori' Aswald, was a young history buff and it is from her that I developed my interest in the subject. She wept at my graduation when she heard I was going to study History at University- she could barely believe that she'd actually managed to persuade me to go into further education, let alone take her favourite subject.

So, the problem was that I breezed the History and Literature papers just fine, but I'd often played truant in high school lessons. Maths was all right, since I have the common sense to follow the narrative of an equation, but I'm definitely not good at sciences. The easy stuff at the beginning was doable, but I suck at the harder stuff. I didn't think it went well.

With an hour to go, I flipped over the front page of the 'Asgard Syllabus' paper, and it was the first time I've ever been grateful to have a roommate who studied Current Affairs. The questions were all on heroity and their motives, and aims. The last part was odd though- it was asking me myself questions. For instance:

_A man has been caught in a building collapse and his leg is trapped under a heavy stone. You have the ability to lift the stone away, but doing so might kill him due to toxic build-up in the trapped limb. The paramedics will arrive in ten minutes, and will amputate the leg. What course of action do you take?_

They were tough questions and I had to wonder if there was any 'right' answer. Obviously, for this one, it was a choice between potentially killing the man but letting him keep his limb or waiting for the paramedics- but he'd lose the leg. It would be more of a kindness to let them deal with it- I wouldn't want to accidentally kill anyone. Perhaps I'd stay with him, to comfort him, if I had the time. This seemed the noble thing to do. Other questions were harder, though.

_A father has two sons. The first inherits all his land and his fortune, while the younger is forced to live in poverty. The eldest is involved in dealings with villains; you are to decide the course of action, assuming you have the law on your side, when the younger files a claim against his brother._

How am I to know? Obviously the first brother should go to jail if he's a criminal… but it doesn't say exactly what kinds of dealings he has with villains. Does he know they're villains, anyway? Does the younger have an ulterior motive? Grr.

Many swathes of crossed-out writing later, I finished the paper and put it down, my stomach rumbling and my hand and back aching. Six hours. Even my history final was going to be shorter than that. Yikes. I yawned, feeling tired. Let's see… it had been two hours in the climate chamber, about half an hour in the ring, and now six here. So I've been up all night. It was now about three a.m., and would be sound asleep by now.

A clock chimed thrice and I knew I was right. From the same door we had entered from, Chie entered. "Are you done?"

"Yes." I replied, my voice hoarse and cracking with tiredness.

"Good. I'll take you to our guest facilities and you can sleep. You will be woken up at eight a.m. sharp."

Five hours? You've got to be kidding. At least it is sleep, I suppose. I had yet to see any heroes, and I was, in a tiny part of my mind, beginning to feel like this was a set-up. This place wasn't cool or historic enough to be a wing of the mighty Hero Empire of Asgard. I felt a bit cheated. Little did I know that not all heroes walk around in disguises protecting cities.

Chie showed me into a small dormitory with five neatly made beds spaced out around it, covered in white and grey blankets. The lack of colour was beginning to get me down. I sighed and thanked her, exhausted out of my mind, and climbed into the soft bed, sleep cushioning my head's fall onto the pillow.

"Get up! Up!" a voice, inhumanly loud, bellowed in my ear. Nao? She knew better… it's Tuesday, and I'm allowed to sleep in… we don't have any lectures. Ugh. I opened my eyes a crack, remembering randomly that I had a penguin clock now. It wasn't there. I shot up in the bed, lookinga round wildly, meeting the eyes of a pissed-looking woman with a load of eye-makeup on. "What are you doing yawning! Get out of bed, now! Bloody slacker…" I was just wondering what the hell this woman was about when my face met the floor with a convincing thud. What the hell?

I looked up to see the woman holding my bed in her right hand, looking no heavier than a teacup. Gulp. "Get up!"

I scrambled out from under her shadow, backing against the wall. Standing up, I examined her. She didn't look too muscly, but was lifting my bed… finally, a hero! She leered at me, setting the bed down unceremoniously. "I swear to god, humans get lazier and stupefied by the day."

"That's stupider, Haruka." Another voice entered the room, a soft one I remembered very well. Diana, but… not. She wasn't wearing her mask or her outfit, instead in a comfortable skirt and a sweatshirt, sporting a pair of specs. This was a plain-clothes hero? She looked like any twenty-something in the city. Oh, I suppose that's the point, but still… very plain. "Sleep well, Nastuki?"

I stared at the two of them. "Uh, alright, I guess."

Haruka snickered. "Good, because you've got twelve hours of pure pain coming your wa-" Diana silenced her with a withering look out of the corner of her eyes.

"If you would follow me." The mirror-hero said courteously. My stomach rumbled rather loudly and again Haruka snickered. I already didn't like the woman, but I was smart enough to know that expressing this to somebody who lifted a bed like it was a sack of feathers was not the appropriate course of action if I wanted to keep all my limbs.

"Yukino, you're so soft." Haruka grumbled as she and Diana talked in front of me. Yukino? Damn, I knew Diana's real name. I was in the loop, so to speak. They spoke for a while as they led me through winding corridors, the décor slowly fading from library-esque to Star trek to the bins behind McDonalds. We descended lower, and the walls became dour and concrete and slightly damp. I wondered how far under the city we must me.

I was surprised when we rounded a corner and Dead-Guy was waiting there with Chie. His nose was completely healed- you would not have known how hard I bit it yesterday by looking at it now. He shot me a wary glare as I approached, dark eyes beneath his brows following me. He looked, on closer inspection, to be inching into his mid-thirties, and his was built leanly, but with plenty of muscle to compensate. Dark hair covered his ears but no further and he was actually rather ugly.

"Welcome to this test. You will each be given a small pack containing a compass, a tinderbox, seven matches sealed in a waterproof case, and one ration pack containing approximately two-thousand kilojoules of energy."

I was beginning to wonder just how many times Chie had said these words, they sounded so mechanical coming out of her mouth. In fact, was she mechanical? I honestly wouldn't have been able to tell. The only thing she'd said was pre-prepared phrases, like the announcement on the tannoy at the supermarket. Must be a boring job.

"You have ten hours, starting as of now, to make your way through the tunnels on the other side on this door to the very centre, where there is one and only one key-code to gain access to the communications system. When we hear you, we'll come and get you."

You know, I think I read this in a Harry Potter book once.

Chie handed me a pack and opened the door into the gloom. Dead-Guy entered behind me and the door was closed, the click of an electronic lock echoing around the tunnels. There were no lights, and obviously the sun didn't shine way down here. I didn't panic, taking a leaf out of Dead-Guy's book. Stay calm and think about it.

These tunnels were obviously a maze, but because I couldn't see anything, I couldn't leave a piece of string like in the Minotaur's Labyrinth. Well, I didn't have string, but that's beside the point. The point, which was being creative and working out a way to get through this by myself.

Dead-Guy was beside me, presumably thinking along the same lines. Even though I couldn't see him, I sensed his presence, and heard the rustling of his clothing. There was only one code… one of us had to lose.

"So." He said slowly, his voice low and almost a purr. His accent was quite posh, from the better-off part of the city. "How are we going to do this?"

"You want to work together?" I asked, incredulous. He turned to me; well, I thought he did anyway.

"Yes. In all likelihood, one of us will betray the other at some point, but up until then, it makes sense to co-operate."

No, it didn't. Why help somebody if you were just going to double-cross him or her? Something about his clam demeanor and his voice told me that he was planning on doing the betraying. What was stopping me from just downing him right now, in the dark, taking his stuff and doing what I pleased?

Ah, a little voice told me it wasn't the right thing to do. It wasn't hero-y. Reluctantly, I hitched the small backpack further up my shoulders and nodded. "Alright."

He smiled a bit creepily through the gloom, and I found that at least my eyesight was adjusting. "We need to keep track of our direction. Chie just said that the code was in the middle- that means that we are facing it right now. If we keep an equal number of left and right turns, we must be able to make our way there in the end."

"They've given us ten hours, though- it's either very complicated or very far."

"Or both." He said. "I'm Ishigami."

"Natsuki." I shook his hand with a tentative alliance that I couldn't help randomly thinking resembled the Nazi-Soviet pact in 1939. We hated each other (capitalism vs. communism) but we allied anyway because Britain was too slow. I don't know which I'd prefer to be, to be honest. This wasn't helping us find the key-code.

We set off, seeing only vague shapes in the gloom. Quickly the pipes became waterlogged and the rancid wastewater soaked into my shoes, much to my disdain. We made a right turn at the first t-junction, and then a left, meaning we were heading directly into the centre. I was trying to remember what happens in the Harry Potter maze in the Triwizard Cup, but I hadn't read the book for ages… well, two of them reach it together, one is possessed… ah, there was a sphinx. Other than that, nothing came up. We sloshed through the tunnels at a decent pace but I could feel Ishigami's eyes darting to me, as if thinking how best to do me off. It was disconcerting and not a hero-ish thing to do.

There were hours and hours of tunnels, and I was thankful that he was mostly keeping track, because I was so lost. Every dank brick wall looked exactly the same; I was lucky that I had a runner's endurance; else I'd be completely flatlining by now.

There were some convection currents down here- little tendrils that would tickle my cheeks now and then, promising fresh air but never delivering. However, we suddenly stopped when I heard a low rumble in the distance.

"You hear that?" I asked in a whisper.

"Yes." He replied, narrowing his eyes and looking strained. The sound did not come again, but we waited for what seemed like hours before resuming. Then, as soon as we'd begun moving, we heard it again. I like horror movies, but never have I had to face something like this in real life. Fear gripped me and I looked around uselessly. The noise became louder, a gurgle and a groan all in one with an underlying tone of aggression. It was accompanied by a sort of slithering sound, and I thought perhaps this _was_ Harry Potter and the basilisk was coming for me. A shadow around the corner of the next t-junction was all the terrifying notice we got before the glistening, scaled, purple head of a snake-thing rounded the corner, yellow eyes luminescent in the gloom, forked tongue flicking in and out of it's moth.

Another head followed it, and soon there were four leering snake heads- a hydra- gliding around the corner with predator-like slowness, eight golden eyes fixated on Ishigami and me. If I was weaker, I would have soiled myself right there, but luckily I have a rebellious streak in me. A small, angry part of my brain said that I was not going to be eaten by a hydra in Fuuka's drainage system. No, I was going to fight.

Ishigami wasn't doing anything, so I went Bear Grylls on the hydra's ass. I pulled the matches out of my backpack and took off my white t-shirt, which was the least damp of my clothing. I struck the match and lit the t-shirt, surprising the hydra's sensitive eyesight.

Yes, I set fire to my shirt.

The hydra roared and lunged with two heads at me (because I was holding the flaming shirt), but I brandished the fire at it and it shied away. The flames were burning my hand, so I had to act fast. With reckless abandon, I ran towards the massive creature, at least four times my height, having to duck low in the drains, and yelled with all my might, jumping stupidly onto one of its feet. It reared and I went flying off, just managing to grab onto a scale, which I crashed into the wall holding.

Great, I have a flaming t-shirt and a scale. Ishigami was looking around, probably thinking to run away. Never one to stay on the sidelines, I had the idea to break the scale into a sharp weapon. It shattered against the wall into several wicked fragments and I nearly smiled, grabbing the pointiest one and launching back at the hydra. Now, when I had decided to take History, I had not thought I would save my life, but because I'd done the ancient history and Greek mythology option in my first year, I knew that if you cut off a hydra's head, two grew back. Well, you could learn the same thing from watching Percy Jackson and the Olympians, but I preferred not to admit I'd seen that.

Burn, baby, burn!

I scrambled into the hydra, whose heads hard to turn around to look at me. I dodged as one came in to eat me and shimmied up one of its long necks, sticking my makeshift dagger in and pushing hard. The monster howled, harsh on my ears and echoing through the tunnels for hours afterwards, and thrashed, but I clamped myself on like a limpet and hacked that thing's bloody head off, sticking my charred t-shirt and blistered hand on it to stop it growing again. The cotton was all burned up by now, sticking to the bleeding stump.

I groaned as the head collapsed and fell off, my arm having suffered third-degree burns. I felt dismayed, because there was no more fire and still three more heads.

Surprisingly, a plume of flame erupted behind me and Ishigami jumped into the fray with his flaming shirt, grappling onto a hydra head and immediately beginning to pummel it into submission. However, the hydra had learned its lesson with me and threw him off. He smashed into the wall with a sickening crack and slid down into the murky water, his shirt catching on a loose brick and staying there like a gaudy torch, showing his limp body, bleeding from his mouth, yellow shadows flickering over his face like a death mask.

With massive thunderous crashes, the hydra took a couple of steps towards me on its fat little legs, heads hissing with gooey spittle dripping from their teeth. Om nom nom.

I honestly thought I was done for when the 'head' head (the one in charge) snaked down to my level. I could have kissed it, it was that close. Obviously I didn't want to, but the opportunity was there. The head tilted slightly, observing me, while issuing foul breath all over my face. For some reason, I knew that something was seeing through its eyes. Behind the yellow, there was someone watching me, assessing me, stopping the hydra from attacking and killing me.

The forked tongue whipped out and tickled the underside of my chin, but I couldn't take my eyes off the presence of the person controlling the hydra. It's maw opened and it bared its fangs, yellow and razor-sharp. I was paralyzed, mesmerized, somehow hypnotized by the controller. I couldn't move as the hydra's teeth grazed against the skin of my shoulder, poison chilling the small wounds and spreading down my body. I couldn't do anything. Couldn't shout, or fight. Just stare until the world went black.


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Just a warning, this chapter contains 2 f-bombs. I'm not putting the rating up just for some swearing, so deal with it or don't read.

This is the last chapter without obvious Shizuru. You've been patient, younglings, and shall be dutifully rewarded. R&R

Chapter 4

I woke sometime later in a small room, the centre of which was filled by a raised table with a small cylinder. I got up, groggily, and looked at myself. My hideously burnt arm was healed perfectly, not a mark on my white skin. All my aches and pains from the fight yesterday had disappeared, and I was wearing a t-shirt, the same as the one I'd burnt trying to fight the hydra. I pulled the collar down to check the poisoned wounds, and found that they were still there, dangerous and purple at the edges. They hurt when I touched them, so I left them alone.

In the cylinder on the central table was the key-code. How had I gotten here? I remembered nothing after I'd passed out. It felt like cheating. I had the fleeting, silly thought that the hydra had carried me here, but dismissed it immediately. Something must have happened. Maybe Ishigami woke up and carried me here, then went off instead of taking the code? I'd never know.

Guiltily, I took the key-code out and walked over to the small, battered communication box on the wall, punching the numbers and letters in. The case sprang open and the display lit up with a dial tone. It clicked on as a voice answered the other side.

"_Hello?"_

I hesitated for a moment before speaking. "This is Nastuki."

"_Good to hear from you. Are you alone?_"

"Yes."

"_Do you know where Ishigami is?"_

"No."

"_All right. Stay there, we'll be down in a moment."_

The line hung up and I waited, disturbed. I had cheated. We hadn't completed the maze. In fact, I'd been lost and freeloading off Ishigami. Then he'd been attacked by the hydra. Had it… killed him? Was he dead? Oh gods, I could not have a dead man on my conscience. Then again, I suppose that heroes couldn't save everyone… they must have hundreds of people they couldn't get to in time plaguing their consciences every day. It was a slightly comforting thought.

The hum of a descending elevator got my hopes up and from a circular shaft in the ceiling descended a platform, on which was Haruka, the strong-woman, carrying a first-aid kit. Seeing it wasn't needed, she set it down and regarded me.

"You managed to keep that shirt mighty clean." She said suspiciously. "When did you last she the other guy?"

"Uh," I didn't know if I should mention the hydra. Not yet, and not to Haruka, I decided. "We parted ways after about two hours."

"Okay." She clicked the button on a walkie-talkie and relayed this information, asking for an infrared scan of the tunnels to find where he was. If he were dead, they wouldn't find him that way. I gulped. "Get up, then. We don't have all day."

I clambered up, already sick of the novelty of platforms transporting me everywhere. There was a point at which I wanted some stairs. It was a short ride up and we came up into a small room with a couple of scientists in white coats and engineers in grey overalls fiddling with some mechanical devices that I couldn't even to begin to name, let alone guess their use. I did see a bearded man fiddling with a bionic arm, though.

Haruka escorted me through the 'Star Trek' section and into the fancy bit, but insisted that I take my nasty, waterlogged boots off before stepping onto the beige carpets. I did as obliged and took the socks off for good measure. My feet were all blistered and wrinkly inside. Ew.

In quite a thin corridor, we crossed paths with a woman I thought I remembered somehow. She was in a doctor's white coat, in her early forties, with short brownish-red hair. Haruka stopped when they reached her.

"Prof. Sagisawa." She said respectfully. "How is Yukino recovering?"

"She'd doing well. I've managed to extract the darts fine, it'll just take her immune system a couple of days to clear the poison out."

Haruka looked relieved and thanked Prof. Sagisawa, continuing on our way. So, Yukino was Diana, and had been injured by poisoned darts. Ouch. It was then that I realized that I was the only one left of the four of us that had come yesterday. Wow. I actually had a chance. And then I'd get hit by poisoned darts. Yay.

"When you go in, you will keep your eyes on the ground until instructed to look up, okay?"

"Yes." I wondered why. Keeping my gaze on my bare feet, I followed Haruka through a massive set of polished wooden double doors that she pushed open like curtains, into a draughty room big enough to be a hall. It almost smelled of power. From what I could see at ankle-level, it was decorated in thick white marble and gold leaf, like I imagined the proper Asgard should look like. As we got further into the room, the sense of cold increased until I was getting flashbacks from the climate room.

"Odin, I present to you Natsuki Kruger, Asgardian Aspirant of Fuuka."

A very large presence shifted in the room and focused on me. Oh my god. It was Odin. Nagi Dái Artai, _the_ Odin. He was in Fuuka? He was based here, in my city? We can't have traveled that far. Or maybe there was some kind of dimensional rift, so every branch of Asgard could access his throne room. Even so, it seemed very formal and kind of fantasy novel-y. Asgardian Aspirant? Try putting that in front of your name. I'd love to get mail addressed to AA. Kruger.

"Rise, Aspirant." He said boredly. I took this as 'you can look at me'. I raised my gaze to meet his and was surprised. He'd outed heroity about forty years ago, but hadn't aged a day. The only indicator that he wasn't a real child was his off-white hair and pinkish eyes, currently probing my own soul with unspoken questions. He suddenly seemed rather interested. "You may address me as Odin."

Right. He continued without me. "Meister Armitage, do you find this Aspirant worthy of body?"

"I do."

"And worthy in mind?"

"I do."

"Then I will decide if she is worthy in spirit." He said gravely, leaving his throne in a swift movement too fluid for young bones. He strode towards me, resplendent in his old-fashioned black and crimson frock coat, embedded with patterns and jewels. He certainly looked the part of king. I was repelled and afraid by his forbidding presence, but stood my ground. He was one of the heroes who would tear you apart with his pinky finger. Gulp. "Aspirant, do you think yourself worthy in spirit?"

Was I? Obviously. No question about it.

"I do."

He smiled. "Then I subject you to the final test." He perused his coat for a minute and I wondered what he was doing. It was then I saw that there were several jewels missing. Where had they gone? Surely you would have sewn them back on. I would have anyway, even though I'm crap at sewing. He pulled one of them, roughly heptagonical in shape, and held it out of his palm. "Take it from me."

I hesitated. That was an order. I wondered if I should take it- what was the test? Then, I said something really stupid.

"Do you want to give it to me?"

He frowned. "No, I want you to take it from me."

"I mean, are you offering it?"

He paused, confused, as though he hadn't expected to hear that. I felt the same. It just seemed so strange- normally I was the type to take the bloody gem from him and be done with it, but I just… hesitated. I considered it. I've never done that before.

"No, I'm not offering it to you. I'm asking you to forcibly take it from me."

"Is that not the same?" I asked, having come across an interesting moral paradigm. "You've kind of dug yourself a hole there."

Haruka tensed beside me and I realized I'd gone to far. I looked at Nagi, expecting him to look angry and smite me or something. Instead, his mouth and eyebrows were quirked in a wry grin and he was regarding me under his short eyelashes with definite amusement. I was about to apologise when he silenced me with a wave of his hand and a chuckle. "Indeed I have. That was the point, as I recall, but I've been doing it so long that I had honestly forgotten." He pressed the gem into my hand. "Well then. Instead of taking it, I'll give it to you."

He closed my hand around the dark blue jewel and stepped back. "I suppose you neither pass nor fail… but I will grant you ascendancy anyway. You amused me."

He clicked his fingers and the gem in my hand melted into my skin, a blinding hot sensation, but ringed by coolness at the same time. This coldfire feeling spread up my arm and all around my body and I felt as you do when you step out of the shower, refreshed, but twenty times as powerful. My eyes rolled back in my head and I stumbled, suffused by a strange and toxic sensation that seemed to pulse under my skin and settle like a sleeping dragon at the peripheral of my consciousness, coiled and ready to take off at any time.

My vision came back and I saw a world in vivid, almost disconcerting colour, tinted slightly as though I was looking through a blue visor of a motorcycle helmet. Haruka was holding me up under my arm and Nagi had already turned around and was sitting back on his throne. I was ushered out and the doors closed behind me.

"It is a lot, isn't it?" Haruka said, almost friendly. She allowed me to shake myself out a bit before moving on.

Oh shit. I just realized. I passed and I changed. Into a hero. Effing Eff on toast.

If I were weaker, I'd have collapsed at the realization. Instead, I held my breath for forty seconds and then puffed it all out in a calming technique that had got me through many annoying History essays. Oh forget it. Can I say fuck? It _is_ justified in this case, even though I promised my parents I wouldn't swear. Well, that lasted all of four years.

"Shit." I said out loud, wanting to hear it in my voice. "Damn, shit… fuck."

That felt so good.

"Excuse me?" Haruka said, slightly shocked. "Don't use that kind of language here!"

"Sorry." I said, not sorry at all. "But it's… wow. Amazing."

Haruka grinned, probably recalling what she'd done when she'd stepped out of the throne room. "Alright, I'll let you off this once, but if you ever use an explosive in my presence again…"

"Um… do you mean expletive?" I asked in what I thought was a kindly voice.

"That's what I said! Now, come on, we mustn't dawdle. There's paperwork to fill out, and I don't have any photocopier credits left."

If you get an onion, and then start peeling it, lots of layers come off. Sorry to use a horrid metaphor, but I found out that Asgard is like an onion.

Heroity is a deeper species than I first thought- yes, there were the 'outed' heroes, who were always themselves, but underneath them were several layers of others. For instance, heroes with dual identities, heroes with strictly admin jobs; unknown heroes, maintenance heroes, heroes under private employ- the list goes on, and Asgard's massive job was to manage all of them at the same time. There were over seventy heroes just working around Fuuka city- though only about fifteen of them were public. I found that not all heroes had extravagant powers- in fact, heroity mimicked humanity quite well. Where humans had great athletes or intellectuals, heroes had 'super' powers- people who could do things beyond the norm. Then, there were other heroes with useful but not offensive abilities, like a 200 mph typing speed, x-ray vision, or a photographic memory at the very least. These were the backbone of Asgard.

I found that my sense of time became very acute- I knew, for instance, without any clocks, that it was late Tuesday night when Haruka finished showing me around. I told her that I had to get back to my roommate, who would be having kittens by now.

"Well, there's a lot more to do. You have a calling now, a job. It's expected of you to turn up."

Hell? I don't even have a power yet! "But I can't do anything useful yet."

She frowned. "After I ascended, the first thing I did after getting home was try and open the door. I ripped half the front side of my house off. It takes some time to gain control."

"What if I have a really destructive power… like, killing all redheads in a fifteen metre radius?"

She almost smiled. "Unlucky redheads." She wasn't going to give me any more, I supposed. I had to figure it out by myself. "Well, I suppose we'll send you some kind of schedule that conforms to your lecture times. It is a great honour to be a hero, you know."

If I'm honest, I don't think I actually quite grasped this. I'd been a bit nonchalant about the whole thing, not having really stepped back to look at it in perspective. I was blown away, yes, but what did this mean for the rest of my life? I had no ambition after school; just getting my degree was hard enough. I scratched my head in a primordial gesture of confusion. It did make some kind of divine sense, if you looked at it. Maybe I hadn't ever felt that there was a job I wanted to do because fate knew I would become a hero. That made me feel a bit better and muscles I didn't know were tensing relaxed, accepting the gift that had been bestowed upon me.

Haruka seemed to have been following my body language and grinned slightly. "I'm going to visit Yukino if the medical wing, if you'd like to visit and thank her. You weren't on Asgard's radar until she arrested you."

"I'd like that." I decided, wanting to face Diana as an equal. We wove through more corridors, to a well-staffed medical centre, run by Prof. Sagisawa, who greeted Haruka warmly and hold her which bed was Yukino's. We entered through the curtain, and the mirror-hero saw us, smiling weakly.

"You didn't have to come, Haruka." She said, her voice soft.

"Nonsense." Haruka replied. "Of course I'd come. You're very impotent to me."

Yukino chuckled. "Important, Haruka."

"I said that." She said for the second time and I was beginning to think that she didn't actually realize that she was making these mistakes. "Nastuki?"

I snapped back into the conversation. "Hmm?"

"Just checking you were still there."

"Sorry, I'm spacing out. It's a lot to take in over just twenty-four hours, you know."

"I know the feeling." Yukino smiled and reached over for a cup of water, wincing with pain.

"What exactly happened?" I asked.

She looked brooding. "I met a villain. Usually only petty human criminals operate within my catchment area, but last night I did battle with one named Piper. He could control rats and shoot darts from his pipe, and I got hit. They were poisonous… he escaped."

"Ouch." I said hopefully helpfully. "Thanks, by the way. For referring me and stuff."

I've always been a bit gruff. Long-winded apologies are not and never have been my thing.

"It's fine, Natsuki. You and I are equals. I look forward to having help in my catchment area."

"I… I'm to help you?" I asked.

"I would think so. To begin with, anyway. Inexperienced, you need someone to watch over you and make sure nothing goes awry. At least for a while."

It made sense. I nodded and we talked for a while about what really hero business was like- apparently quite boring unless something happened. I found out that Yukino, as a public hero, had no other life. She did two shifts of watching out for crime: four p.m. to one a.m. and then a shorter one early in the morning. It sounded hard.

"It's not, really. I don't need much sleep, so often my shifts go on longer. I'm respected everywhere I go, so I can easily check if there is anything going on just by talking to the locals."

She was right. We heart Diana.

"Why Diana?" I asked suddenly. "I mean, heroes have pseudonyms, but how do they choose them?"

She shrugged. "Well, I happened to be reading Anne of Green Gables at the time when I was invited to Asgard… the name just seemed right to adopt as a moniker."

"I have no idea what I should call myself," I said sullenly. I honestly had no sort of epiphanies, no special nicknames, nothing. When I was in middle school I got called Nat, or Natty, but I quelled that pretty quickly by being nasty and aloof. It was Natsuki or nothing to Fuuka's 'ice princess'. I grimaced, remembering how I pushed those potential friends away.

"Well, don't worry right now. You'll only need to name yourself when you gain more public attention, which won't be a while. I'd concentrate on finding out what you can do and learning to control it."

I already liked Diana. She was cool-headed and mature, though startlingly different and more aggressive when her mask was on. I suppose that having an alternate personality that you can slip into helps maintain your personal life. I must call her Yukino, though.

Soon conversation exhausted itself and Chie magically reappeared. She seemed pretty unanimous.

"Well, you'll receive your license in the mail once we have all of the paperwork sorted." She said briskly, but then utterly disappeared. I looked around, confused, still on the spot. Was that her power? Teleporting, disappearing, what?

A few minutes later, from behind me, I heard panting and the sound of feet against the hard floor. Chie came around the corner, but not like I knew her. She was in casual jeans and a baggy sweater; glasses perched precariously on the end of her nose and a ring of keys jangling on her belt. "Sorry!" she said, looking at me with some kind of annoyance, but it was at herself. "I totally ran out of energy."

"Huh?" I asked, not quite following.

"Well, business Me has been showing you around while I was doing other things." She suddenly split in half and Chie in the suit appeared next to her, and then faded away. "I got a bit distracted and so she vanished."

I regarded 'normal' Chie for a moment. "Ah. Okay."

She guiltily tucked some hair behind her ear and blushed, and I wondered exactly what distracted her. "Here, follow me, I'll show you out." Chie beckoned, hitching her sweater back up her shoulder.

"What happened to the other three?" I asked, remembering what I had wanted to ask. It wasn't that I didn't trust Haruka, but the thought of being thrown across the Atlantic didn't appeal if she got angry. At least Chie's power explained why I'd thought that she was a robot- how many of the different Chie's could she materialize? Did she directly control them, or could they do their own thing?

"Well, the first, who passed out, recovered fine. The one you K-O'd in the ring has sore genitals, but he'll recover. They'll have their memories wiped later today, before they go back."

I frowned. "Isn't that a bit cruel?"

Chie shrugged noncommittally. "Better than compromising our defenses."

"What about Ishigami?" I said, my voice cracking on the last syllable. Sure, I was thinking of betraying him and getting the key-code myself, but I did not intend for him to get too much lovin' from a hungry hydra. I still didn't know how he was, but a little niggling sensation behind my left eye told me that I knew he was dead. At least he went out with a bang- and then a crunch, and then a slow slump against the wall. Morbid.

"They're still looking. We can't find him on the infrared, so he must be in water."

"Chie?"

"What?"

"Is there anything… down there?"

She stopped and raised an eyebrow. "Like what?"

"Things. Creatures."

"No! We wouldn't do that kind of thing! It's just an exercise of navigation and creativity." She looked at me funny. "Why, did you see anything?"

"Ah… no. Just some rats."

"Well, rats are a given in any sewer. As long as they aren't massive and flesh-eating, we'll let them go for now."

I felt bad for lying but didn't bring it up, thinking of the poison wounds under my t-shirt. The hydra had killed Ishigami, I was sure of it now. What would they do when they find him… or would they find him at all? Maybe it had eaten him. I was still wondering how I'd gotten to the centre room while I was passed out, too. I wasn't doing very well with the justice and chivalry thing, was I, keeping all these secrets?

While I was thinking, we'd pressed on through the star trek bit of Asgard back to the platform room. I supposed I was going to have to remember where all this was if I was to visit often- people would tire of herding me around after a while.

"Well, I'm not going with you from here. If possible, when you get back to Linden Baum, leave your number with the manager. She's one of us, and we may need to contact you for an emergency. You'll get a pager when everything is sorted out, but just for now…"

"All right." I wished her well. "How many of yourself can you make, Chie?"

She smiled, catlike and playful. "As many as I have aspects of my personality, but not all of them are useful."

"Ah."

"It was nice meeting your for real, Natsuki."

"Same."

She operated the controls and I hopped onto the platform, as it started moving, taking me back to the secret station under Linden Baum. I thought as I rode, fighting an overwhelming sense of 'shit, I'm deep in it'. I was going to be a hero, and a damn good one. This wasn't like a paper or an exam- this was, as Haruka had said, a calling.

And I was damn well answering it.


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: You've been patient for a couple of chapters, and hopefully you'll have picked up on some sneaky subtext and inferences, but I will not deprive you of Shizuru any longer. Brownie guide promise.

Chapter 5

I scanned the nearly empty lecture hall in front of me with my newly improved eyesight. From my position at the back, I could see the swearwords scratched into the desks on the front row. It was cool- I never knew that 'Satoshi is a ****'. I drummed my fingers against my own desk boredly, waiting for my professor to arrive. Historically, Fr. Greer was a very prompt teacher. He was a local priest on top of being a lecturer at the university and was very well learned, and respected too. I found him a little boring sometimes, as he tended to ramble, but ask him what happened on a specific date in history and he could tell you in astonishing detail.

More people filed in slowly, including Takeda, who dutifully took his place next to me with a short greeting. The Friday lecture was always a bitch, in terms of length (Three hours- two of lecture, one of work) and homework assignments- because it was the weekend, Fr. Greer had decided we needed to spend all that time working and gave us massive case studies, essays, or practice papers, with the finals coming up.

In the end, I drifted off while waiting for him and missed the first twenty minutes. Takeda filled me in- Fr. Greer was late because I big clash between a hero and villain in town had blown up some of the road, and a massive traffic jam had formed on the diversion roads. I felt (slightly) smug when he told me. Only very slightly.

Oh, whom was I kidding? I was happy off my face at the moment. I hadn't seen Diana- sorry, Yukino- again yet, but I was dutifully waiting for any sign. I felt vibrant and powerful. I had no responsibilities yet, only increased stamina, speed and endurance. My mind was quick to work things out. The only thing that bothered me was that I didn't yet know what my actual power was- well; good things come to those who wait. So I did. Still, there was something unbearably intoxicating about bench-pressing twice my body weight with only minimal strain, even if I wasn't Haruka pulling the sides of houses off. Plus, I could put the speed and incline of the treadmill up loads and still run my normal distance. I felt healthy and looked radiant- Takeda couldn't help staring.

"Natsuki?" Fr. Greer said and I snapped back to attention. "Would you care to explain what Stalin's key points of interest were in 1934?"

"Uh." I blanked out. Ah, I remember Stalin. Nazi-Soviet pact between Ishigami and me. "Well, there was the Great Purge of the Communist Party to remove his opposition. He was building up the cult of personality surrounding him, to ensure he remained in power for as long as possible… And, he was worried about Sergey Kirov gaining too much popularity."

Fr. Greer raised a skeptic eyebrow. "Yes. Do try to listen, though."

I slumped back in my seat and let out a sigh of relief. I do know my History quite well- little did I know at the time that History really would repeat itself.

After the lecture I rushed out, feeling oppressed by the stuffy room. Takeda scurried after me.

"Nastuki." He breathed, all puppy-like and adoring. "Are you doing anything now?"

"Not really." I replied nonchalantly, fiddling around in my bag for my keys, finding only discarded papers and the occasional rogue tampon- the packet had exploded ages ago and I kept finding them everywhere. Nao said they'd crawled into the walls of our apartment and were reproducing.

"Great. Can I buy you a coffee?"

Oh dear. He's at it again. Breathe in, hold for forty seconds, and breathe out. He's annoying, but you mustn't hit him- with the new strength I had, it might do some lasting damage.

"You know what, Takeda?" I said defiantly. "You can."

His eyes widened. "Really?"

"Just once."

The poor man almost wet himself with glee, I swear. "Right. How about we go to Costa just around the corner?"

"Fine." I said, pouting at my bike, and mentally promising it I'd be back soon. Don't worry, baby, you're still my only love. Wow, that sounded sad.

We walked awkwardly to the coffee shop, but I relaxed when the scent of roasting beans hit me. I liked the taste of coffee, but the smell was better. Takeda opened the door for me and I made an order, sitting down at a table. There was a bit of a queue, so Takeda would be waiting a couple minutes.

From across the shop, I saw someone obscured by a paper. The headline said _Fuuka in Distress: mystery suicides of political figures linked with rising villain threat. _Now, I wasn't one to get sucked in by that whole tabloid sensationalist junk, but I had been following this story quite closely. Over the last three months, five political figures had committed violent suicides. There was no doubt that they were self-inflicted- notes had been left explaining why to loved ones, written by the politicians themselves, but everyone attested that they were all strong-willed and mentally healthy individuals. So we were all wondering why.

I was halfway through reading the article when the person holding the paper set it down to receive a mug of tea from a waitress, but instead of looking at her, blood-red eyes gazed directly at me. A chill ran down my spine and a tingle of familiarity flashed behind my eyes, too quick to grab, but obvious enough to remember. I frowned, quickly averting my gaze. I had just been reading someone else's newspaper- no big deal. Why did I feel guilty and put-upon, then? It made no sense.

Takeda came back with the drinks, thankfully obscuring the heated gaze of the newspaper-reader. That was the first and only time I wished to put the adverb 'thankfully' before any verb in Takeda's life.

"So." He said bashfully. "How are you finding the revision?"

"Okay, I suppose." I replied. "And you?"

"I wish there was some was to distill information into cubes and eat it." He grumbled. "But I'll take any graces that I come across. What with Kendo and all, I barely have time to do anything else."

"I empathize. Of all the subjects I could have picked, History and Lit take up the most of my time."

"Better than hairdressing." He joked, taking a sip of coffee and accidentally scalding his tongue. "Ow! Ow!"

"Way to impress a girl, macho man." I chuckled, amused by how hard he was trying. "But Takeda, we have to seriously talk about this."

"About what- ow."

"I don't fancy you. I've known you since high school and I haven't grown to like you as any more than a friend with time. Soon we'll be going separate ways, and I really want you to drop the crush."

He blushed and stared into his coffee, sighing slightly. "I know that… I just want to keep trying. I really like you, Natsuki. I did even when you were a bitch to me in high school."

Wow. Stick it to the man, Takeda. I'm a bitch.

"But- I can't help it. You can't just stop liking someone."

"Under what circumstances would you stop liking me?" I asked, considering this carefully. I didn't want Takeda dogging me around, but neither did I want to send him into a spiral of depression. This would be a tightrope-esque balancing act.

"I don't know." He thought about it for a bit. "I suppose if you got old and ugly, that would be a turn-off."

"That isn't going to happen for a while, idiot."

"Tcha! I know. You didn't specify any criteria." He made an unhappy face. "Well, maybe if you were like a supervillain. Or a mass-murderer. Or if you already had a boyfriend- it would be dishonourable of me to attempt to win you off somebody else."

"Ah. Well, Takeda, if I told you I was dating someone right now, how would you feel about that?"

"I'm not stupid." He said tetchily. "You've never had a boyfriend. I've never seen you with one."

"What if…" I racked my brains. "What if I told you that there's a reason I'm living with Nao?"

His face went deathly pale, like he'd seen a ghost. Most people, towards the end of high school, had found out about Nao's less than savoury sexual practices from a boy she'd dumped who wanted revenge and outed her to the school. Takeda knew all this, and that was the reason he was looking at me quite so distraught.

He swallowed and started to speak a couple of times but choked, deciding to take a sip of coffee before continuing. "R-Really?"

"Yes." I said, blush alighting on my cheeks. "But you can't tell anyone. Now you know why I haven't had a boyfriend."

"Oh." He said somewhat disappointedly, voice a bit hollow. "Well, if that's how it is, I'm sorry for bothering you."

Takeda got up to leave, obviously repelled and devastated.

"No, Takeda- don't go. It doesn't have to affect our-"

"Our what?" he said angrily. "Friendship? Be serious, Natsuki. We were never proper friends. It was always based on the premise that eventually we could be something more. For me anyway." Oh god, he was almost crying. "I hope you live well."

He stormed out, wiping his eyes. Oh god. Everyone was looking at me. From the corner, I saw the newspaper-reading woman watching me with a slight smirk, crimson eyes twinkling with repressed amusement. She folded up her paper and her mug of tea, looking as though she was going to walk out. But no, as luck would have it, she came to sit directly opposite me- in Takeda's chair.

The rest of the café were looking at me suspiciously, so I daren't speak loudly. Mortified, I looked down into the depths of my coffee, hoping to perhaps fall in and never have to go out in public again.

After a few minutes they go bored of looking at me and slowly returned to their conversations. Even the barista started serving drinks again, gabbing loudly to his friend who was replacing the milk. I sighed, slouching in my seat, thinking to run away before I had to look at the red-eyes stranger again.

"So," she- for the newspaper-reader was a woman- said in a thick and fluid voice that washed over my ears like liquid calm, "Bad day?"

I scowled, not deigning to answer her question. I don't talk to strangers, especially ones with seductive voices.

"Ara, from your silence I will assume so." She said softly, staring at me, though I kept my eyes lowered. There was something familiar and creepy about this woman's appearance, but I couldn't place it. This had been happening a lot lately. "I don't happen to know your situation; I thought you may want some company. It makes sense to only occupy one table, to free the other for the rest of the clientele."

"I was just leaving." I said guardedly, gulping down my coffee to finish it. I wasn't going to have a conversation with a randomer when I was already feeling deflated from my pre-lecture high.

"All right. Have a safe journey."

I frowned. "You're not going to try and stop me?"

She chuckled. "Why would I? I merely observed you alone, and thought to talk to you, though you were rather rude."

"Uh," I said very intellectually. "Well… thanks, but I'd rather go home and eat loads of ice-cream to forget what just happened."

"And why would ice-cream make you forget?" She asked mock-quizzically, tilting her head to the side. "I would think wallowing in one's sorrows would be better facilitated by chocolate."

"It's chocolate ice-cream."

"Ah!" she said, as though she'd had an epiphany. "That would explain it."

"You're weird." I told her tactlessly. "Do you usually mock random people in coffee shops?"

"I try not to make a habit out of it." She purred, sipping her tea. "But I do enjoy it."

"Um… right." I fiddled with my keys. "Soo…"

"We should perhaps start with names?" she suggested. "I am Shizuru Viola."

"Natsuki Kruger." I said hesitantly. "What do you do for a living?"

Shizuru- that was a gorgeous name- smiled and slid the paper over the table. "I'm a leader writer for the _Chronicle_."

I picked up the paper and scanned the front page- the one I was reading. Sure enough, in a small box at the end, was the accreditation 'by Shizuru Fujino'.

"Is Fujino a pen-name?" I asked curiously.

"Yes. Some people don't like the things I write, so I prefer not to give them chance to locate me."

"Ouch. Sounds tough." I agreed, glancing over the article again. She was very good- mature writing style, engaging and witty enough to keep me reading but presenting the facts neutrally without losing track of the story. "You've got a nice style."

"Thank you," she said with that charismatic smile. "And yourself?"

I seemed to be getting asked this a lot lately. "I'm a third year History and Literature student at the University."

"The one around the corner?"

"Yes."

"I've been meaning to write something about the affect of heroes and villains on education," Shizuru mused. "I don't suppose you'd mind giving me an interview?"

"Me?" I asked. "I'm not much."

"Oh, a person is more than the sum of her parts." The reporter said slyly, taking a pen out of nowhere. She wrote something on a clean napkin in quick but clear cursive- journalist's handwriting, I remembered. "Here. I'd love to interview you. At your convenience, of course."

I picked up the napkin and read it. There was a name and phone number. "I'll get back to you."

"I look forward to it." She grinned and stood up in a flowing movement. I got a good look at her- tall and slender, but curvy like I could never hope to achieve. She was dressed for business- crème blouse and pencil skirt with sensible heels. I'm not one to go on about someone's appearance, but she was very good-looking. Beautiful, even, but her eyes disconcerted me. She looked dangerous, and the expression on her face said that she'd just found out all that she needed to know.

"Goodbye, Natsuki." Shizuru said, sauntering out and leaving me, once again, a loner in a coffee shop.

I slammed the front door of my flat with a sigh and wished, for a brief and random second, that I were a hedgehog. Wouldn't life be so much simpler?

"I'm home!" I shouted cautiously. Nao had morning lectures on a Friday, so usually when I came home she was sprawled on the sofa watching telly. There was no sign of her- the apartment was empty. Rent wasn't due for two weeks, so she wasn't at the bank… hmm. Strange.

Deciding to put it down to a surprise run to the supermarket for milk or something, I pulled the promised tub of ice cream out of the freezer and changed into my pjyamas- then I decided that it was too hot for trousers, so I went with an oversize shirt and a nightdress and plonked myself down on the sofa, grappling around for the remote and flicking channels until the motocross came on. I settled with my ice cream and my motorbikes to an evening of blissfully irresponsible college time-wasting.

I heard something clunk through the letterbox just as the race was finishing, so I got up to get it. It wasn't unusual to get mail at weird times- our streets was on the border of two different postmen's rounds, so some got delivered by one of them early in the morning and the rest got delivered any time in the afternoon.

I picked up the rubber-band bound wad of envelopes and lazily ambled back to the living room, flicking through them. Bill, bill, junk, bill- magazine for Nao, bill, junk- and then at the bottom was an anonymous-looking letter addressed to- weirdly- AA. Natsuki Kruger. I almost laughed before realizing that either I'd randomly known the prefix of that somebody had ready my mind.

I set the others down on the kitchen table and took the exciting one back to the sofa. I hated opening letters- I couldn't do it without practically ripping them apart, and this one was no different. I struggled for a minute before relenting and tearing it. If I didn't learn to do this in a year, I swear on my Ducati that I'll buy a letter opener.

_For the attention of Natsuki Kruger,  
Please notice enclosed is the QUPAH (amended by the 4th clause of the bill of heroic rights, section II, paragraph VII), for personal use should such a situation arise in which your status of AA (Asgardian Aspirant) is challenged. It should be carried at all times and readily accessible. In addition, please find in the annex a communication from Diana (a.o. Yukino Crysant) and The General (a.o. Haruka Armitage).  
This letter will self-destruct in three days. Please be aware that misplaced destructing letters may cause fires and property destruction that Asgard is not responsible for.  
Regards,_

_The office of Chie Hallard._

I pulled the small credit-card sized thingy out curiously. It read QUPAH- Qualified to Unanimously Perform Acts of Heroism. There was a mug shot of me that I don't remember posing for, along with my details. It had the seal of Asgard pressed into it- a complicated coats of arms that I couldn't quite distinguish in only the white light of the telly.

Great, another card to thicken my wallet to an impossible size that could not on any account fit into my pocket.

I put it away and took out the 'communication' from Yukino and Haruka, scanning it quickly. It was like they were arguing on paper, Yukino even correcting Haruka's misspellings instead of crossing them out. Anyway, the basics were that Yukino would like to train me in the art of heroism, starting Tuesday mornings because she knew I went to the gym and shopping in the afternoon. Then, Thursday evenings and Saturday nights, starting next Saturday because I wasn't ready to actually go out patrolling yet. I needed to do some admin, like getting a pseudonym and a costume. An effing _costume_? No way was I going Wonder Woman, not in a million years.

Still, I knew it had to be done and tucked the letter away safely (not telling where). Motocross was getting boring, and I checked the clock, seeing it was only eight p.m. That was a bit depressing. At twenty-two, the height of my life, I was sitting in my flat alone on a Friday watching motocross and eating ice cream. I needed some friends.

Speaking of friends, I pulled the napkin out (again, not telling where I store these things) and glared at it, imagining sickly-smooth Shizuru and her salacious smile. Yes, Literature student. Thank you. Look it up, people. I flipped open my phone and punched her number in, saving it into my contacts before wondering what I'd do. I had made Nao swear to shoot me if I ever got boring enough to watch the gardening channel, so that was out. Going for a stroll would most likely turn out badly, since I either get chased by drunk lads or somebody tries to mug me. I don't have a great track record with the outside world.

In the end, I was studious enough to do some of Fr. Greer's homework. Call me a sad-o, but hey, it has to get done. By the end of it it's about time to go to bed, so I locked up and yawned myself to sleep, saying goodnight to Tick-Tock the penguin clock and fell blissfully asleep.

I didn't see the figure looking up at my window.


	6. Chapter 6

Ach… thanks for waiting! I did my second to last exam today, History paper 2. You know what came up, lol? The Nazi-Soviet Pact. Hurrah for weird coincidences, eh? Anyway, Here is an action-packed chapter with a lil bit of everything I was asked for!

Chapter 6

I had to wipe a sheen of sweat off my brow as I hopped off the bus, growling under my breath at how bloody hot it was. Linden Baum was decked out in posters advertising a new milkshake and I was sorely tempted to buy one, but refrained. I needed to meet Yukino here before we'd go into Asgard to get the admin done.

The bell chimed as I entered and I sat down- I was early. A waitress came over to take my order and I looked up, expecting to see the same indistinct one as last time- but instead stared into the deep blue eyes of my former best friend and classmate, Mai.

"May I take your-" she broke off and her eyes widened. "Natsuki?"

"You may not." I joked. My Natsuki is not to be taken, which sounds odd even as I say it. "Hi, Mai."

She went totally psychotic girly-girl on me and practically glomped me where I was sitting, launching into a suffocating hug.

"Oh my god!" she said delightfully as the patrons looked around at us. I was getting tired of being stared at in cafés by now. "?"

"Spaces, Mai. Add them to that sentence." I said. In fact, it was three separate sentences, or I suppose at least clauses. But that's the sad part of me speaking.

She took a deep breath and steadied herself. "Of all the places… you always hated cafés."

"I'm meeting someone."

She looked shocked. "You got a boyfriend?"

'No! Idiot!" I said, blushing. Ugh. Mai had been constantly trying to set me up with boys in high school. "Just a friend."

"Aww, good to hear you made some!" Mai said perkily, looking me over. "Who's your friend?"

"Uh, someone I've just started working with." I half-lied.

"Called?"

"Yukino."

"Ah." Mai said politely. I wondered about her sudden change in attitude. "So… what are you doing nowadays."

"Studying."

"Any jobs on the side?"

"No."

"But you just said you'd started working with this Yukino."

Son of a Gundam.

"I didn't say what kind of work it was." I replied sternly. "It could have been a project at Uni."

"But it isn't." Mai accused me. "You may fool others, Natsuki, but I put up with you for four years. There isn't much you can hide from me."

"What would I have to hide?"

"A secret?"

She stared at me hard- I stared back harder, dredging the Kruger Death-Glare back up from my younger years. I won the competition.

"Knowing you, Natsuki, it's probably something dangerous. Don't die."

"I'll try my best." I said wryly and she walked off. I felt bad for coming off at odds with her, but I don't want to be a public hero. Yet, anyway. Wait until the end of Uni to decide anything as big as that. Still… I don't want to make an enemy of her.

I was wondering where Yukino was- it was getting nearer to ten o'clock and she'd said to meet at half nine. Then, out of the blue, a scream tore through the people in the café, and from across the street a huge crash resounded around the area. I snapped my head to look and came across a strange sight: the apartment building opposite Linden Baum was a smouldering ruin, and three figures were floating above it, standing on a lattice of thin strands of what looked like silk- of cotton, maybe, I couldn't tell from this distance.

I had the urge to go and look, but at the same time it would be suspicious, since nobody else was moving, merely staring in fright.

We were frozen; nobody would bring themselves to move as they surveyed the scarred rubble opposite. That was, until a projectile came whizzing into the café- straight at me!

I hastily scrambled out of the way, and an arrow, as in old-fashioned Indian brave arrow, broke through the shop's front window and hit the side of the booth where my head had been a moment earlier. A scrap of cloth was attached to it, and something was written on it:

_Come on out, little hero._

I gulped and looked around. For once, nobody was looking at me; rather the explosions going off on the cars of the street that shattered the other windows transfixed them. I looked around and on impulse, took the white tablecloth off my table and ran outside into the fray where pedestrians were screaming and running around like headless chickens. To protect my identity, I tied the tablecloth around my head, and then pulled the loose end around and over my mouth, so only my eyes were showing under my makeshift hood. Yes, I looked like a prick, but my need for anonymity went further than my fashion sense.

The trio hopped down from the web- for that was what it was- gracefully, landing perfectly on the pavement opposite me. I was not dressed for battle; hell, I was wearing jeans. And I didn't know what my power was yet.

The three villains were diverse in appearance. The one on the left as a woman in a sweeping nun's habit, which was also hiding her true identity. She held a writhing, crackling bow of some kind of energy, which obviously the arrows had come from. The right one was shorter and covered head to toe in spider-like armour and decoration, with a visor on the top half of her face obscuring her eyes- though a cruel smile played on her lips and her fingers were hideous claws with bright-red nails longer than my forearm.

The centre one was the obvious leader. She was also Shizuru, which was a blow to my self-esteem.

"Ara, I did say I was coming for an interview." She purred, taking a couple of sultry strides towards me. "I'm dearly hoping I have to torture one out of you, though."

"What the hell!" I asked her, almost shouting to counter the muffling effect of my disguise. "We were in a coffee shop just last week!"

"And?"

"And, what the hell!"

"My, Natsuki should watch her language. Her parents would turn in their graves if they hears such atrocities from their daughter's mouth."

I narrowed my eyes. "My parents aren't dead."

"And the proof for this is…?" Shizuru asked. She needed no mask- her face was completely changed by cruelness. She wore a flowing dark red coat- way darker than her eyes, but not black enough to be, well, black. It was unbuckled and had the sort of livery and whatnot you'd expect to see on an old-fashioned naval commander or pirate captain's clothes. Underneath, she wore a black lace-up corset, gothic-style, with white lace, completed by white short (short) shorts, baring her (excellent) legs to the world. On her feet were black boots again laced in white, just below her knees.

I'm sorry to have lost track of the situation, but she is _hot_.

"A vacant stare is not befitting of such a handsome face." Shizuru said calmly, coming forward so that we were almost within reaching distance. She looked into my eyes, but somehow she was seeing herself, and smirked. "And what sort of hero are you, hmm?"

"A normal one."

She sneered, an expression of contempt that twisted her beauty away. "There is not such a thing as a normal hero. You're either a blundering zealot or a blind follower. Which category do you belong in?"

"Neither. I'm my own person."

"Then you have been fooled." Shizuru said, her malevolence fading away to almost care. "Come with me. Let me show you just how 'great' heroity is in reality- they are peons, like pawns on Dái Artai's chess board. Expendable scapegoats. Do you really want to be a part of that?"

"You're lying!" I insisted. "I've met Odin. He isn't evil."

She hissed ferally, coming up to her full height and closing the distance between us, so much that she was staring right into me. "You do not know what your precious Odin is. When you find out, you are doomed."

"Shut up! You're so full of shit!"

"Liar. I know how you see me." Shizuru accused me, pressing herself up against me. "You'd like this, hmm?"

My face flushed a deep red, but I couldn't bring myself to push her off. She held some kind of thrall over me; the hydra wounds on my shoulder throbbed painfully, bringing the memories of the tunnels back up to the surface of my mind. "Get off me."

"Say it convincingly."

"Get off me, Shizuru."

"What's the magic word?"

I growled. "Please."

She dutifully disconnected from me, but only stepped back slightly, still within touching distance. "Very good."

"I'm not going anywhere- least of all with you." I warned her.

"Ara, Natsuki thinks she has any say in the matter?" Shizuru asked with mock-surprise. "I assure you that Julia has very creative ways of ensuring that you do, in fact, leave here with us."

She gestured to the spider-woman, who approached slowly, delighting in sending out a few thick strands of web to entangle passers-by on the way.

"Then I'll fight you."

"Will you, now?"

"Yes."

She cocked an eyebrow and sighed. That was all the warning I got before a blur picked me up and flew with me over the top of Linden Baum, smashing me with inhuman force onto the concrete roof. I felt my spine bend and tense at the impact, sending a rush of pain to my nerves. "Fight, then, Natsuki."

I scrambled up and backed away, sharing straight at Shizuru. She didn't look as though the wind had even disturbed her hair, which fell gently over her shoulders in a perfect tawny sheet. We circled each other, me low and crouched in a balanced fighting position, her stepping confidently.

"You're scum." I spat at her. "I actually thought you were being nice to me on Friday. Turns out, you're a liar and a villain."

"Tell me something I don't know," she replied, perfectly balanced without effort or intention. "I'm not a woman of violence, Natsuki. Save yourself the humiliation and just come with me."

"No."

She came at me again with crazy speed, darting around me, playing with me. I lashed out with my fist, but she caught it mid-punch and twisted my wrist in its socket as easily as turning a doorknob. Shit, that hurt. I backed off while she launched a volley of blows at me- but I realized, not at my vital areas. She didn't want to kill me.

Nevertheless, all of the blows hit home and I staggered backwards, narrowly dodging a kick that would have winded me and having to scamper behind the café's ventilation shaft. Shizuru chuckled a few metres away. Shit. I was absolutely no match for her- she was fast and strong and knew what she was doing- I was barely a hero!

The disguise was suffocating me as I breathed, so I tore it off. Nobody was watching the roof; anyway- I could see Julia the spider-woman wreaking havoc downstairs. Collecting my courage, I left the protection of the shaft and went to face Shizuru openly.

She was _texting_.

"Oh!" She closed the phone and put it away. "I was just waiting for you to man up."

A strange sort of presence surrounded her and I took a step back, feeling menaced. "I'm not a coward."

"That's like saying that I'm not a villain." She said simply. "A lie."

With a flash, she was next to me and pushed me backwards. I struggled but regained my balance, coming back with a low kick. She spun out of the way, blatantly amused that I was even trying. This strengthened my resolve and caused anger to bubble up into my chest, and I double my offensive, going savage on her, kicking and punching whenever the chance arose. She blocked, parried or dodged them one after the other, mocking me, beguiling me to give up hope. But I wouldn't- I was Natsuki Kruger, and I am not a wimp.

From some deep, cut-off crevasse inside my mind, liquid rage flowed out and a barrier shattered. Coldfire rolled down my arms, singing in my blood, pulsing beneath my skin, and a strange mist began to issue from my eyes and mouth, twisting my body and making my muscles knot and tense under my skin - it was thick and freezing cold, but didn't affect me at all. The fog stretched in swaying tendrils over the rooftop, emanating from a seeded hatred in my heart. The ingrained sense of justice, the uncontrollable urge to put things right- it exploded within me, and my soul shone silver.

Then a blanket of smog obscured everything on the roof, but it was my natural habitat- I was stronger inside it, at an advantage, able to move freely. Shizuru was looking around, afraid- whatever tricks she bound me to, they were forgotten in the haze. My nostrils flared and an icy cloud of water vapour billowed out. I felt like a demon, my feet making no sound, instead cushioned on plumes of mist.

It was by absolute instinct that I knew what to do- the mist coiled around my hand in a thick glove of swirling power. Like I kid, I made my fingers into a gun and shot at Shizuru, vaguely surprised when a tiny, electric-blue bullet of condensed power shot out, sending the coldfire rippling under my skin. It struck her on the shoulder and she whirled around, looking for me.

"Ara…" she said, with a slightly bitter tone; that of someone sure of themselves afraid of being bested. "Natsuki had learned to hide herself even better than behind a ventilation shaft. I offer my congratulations."

The mist pulsed around her, writhing into a likeness of my face. She stumbled back, only to be met by a sea of vaguely corporeal hands outstretched. She shied away from them, confused and alone. "You cannot hide forever."

"You can't find your way out, either."

"Then it seems we are deadlocked." She turned to me, or rather, the direction that my voice had come from. I let the mist dissipate around me and walked towards her, confidence running through my veins. "You don't look awfully hero-like."

"You didn't look like a skank when I first met you," I sneered. "Looks are only skin deep."

"I am mildly offended," Shizuru conceded, her red eyes locking onto mine through the gloom. "But Natsuki will not walk away from here the victor."

"Neither will you."

She smiled and stepped towards me. This time I wasn't afraid- I had total freedom of movement within my fog, and I could be the other side of the roof if I wanted to in a split second. We became close and she ran her hand down my bare arms, feeling the power pulsing beneath, breathing an excited sigh. "How does it feel?"

"Don't you know?" I asked, not willing to concede to her ministrations, even though her fingers were playing a dangerously warm piano of feeling down my arm.

"I was always like this. I know nothing other than power. But Natsuki has been human for her whole life… there must be a great difference."

"Yes." I breathed and she moved up my forearm and reached the sleeve of my t-shirt, running her digits along my collarbone tenderly until she found the hydra wounds.

"Once bitten, twice shy." She said playfully. "Three times and you're mine." The scars throbbed against her touch, seemingly alive, rippling over my shoulder. "Does it hurt?"

"Ah- s-sort of." I blushed, my mind blank. "What do you mean?"

"You'll see." She pushed her body against mine, grabbing my collar to keep me close. "Flesh is weak, Natsuki. It desires, and as such, those who speak its language can manipulate it. Don't forget that."

"Stop." I breathed, heavy eyelids fluttering under her thrall. This was _my_ habitat- I was the boss here. And still, she managed to one-up me. It infuriated me; somewhere beneath the churning pleasure she was inducing, too far to reach for. Shizuru brought her mouth to mine, the quivering shadow of a kiss, my lower lip held captive.

Pain exploded as two points of venom shot through me. Shizuru chuckled and retracted a pair of long, snake-like fangs. Blood dribbled down my chin and onto the floor with a resounding splash. "I like you, Natsuki. You're… interesting."

The poison took its hold and my body became numb. Fear and dread bubbled up through me, as I looked at Shizuru and saw only the maw of the hydra leering at me. She was evil- through a through, with no redeeming aspects whatsoever. I wondered then… did she even understand the concept of justice? Could she comprehend any of the underlying moral structure of a normal person's mind?

"Shiz..ur.." I tried to ask, gurgling, as she encircled my form with strong, smooth arms.

"Shh." She said. "I promise not to let you be harmed."

Huh? I'm already quite sore. Shit. Don't… don't fall asleep. Don't succumb to the poison. I tried to purge the toxin from my body, willing my blood to cycle faster and my kidneys and liver to work harder, but there was nothing I could do. My eyes closed and my breathing slowed, while Shizuru picked me up like a ragdoll.

"That took you longer than expected." I voice I recognized so well said grouchily… why can't I put one and one together? "I nearly decided to kill some people."

"Julia should learn some patience." Shizuru said in a bored voice. "She was more problematic than anticipated."

"You were the one who went to scout her out." Julia said. "You came back saying that she was cute and harmless."

"A conversation in a coffee shop is not the same as a full profile."

"And you think I'd have one?"

"You know her best."

"Tch."

They rejoined the nun and I faded out of consciousness.

I dreamed rough and callous dreams- a motorcycle crash, the grating scrape of leather against asphalt, the dying light through a cracked visor. Encroaching sirens and unwelcome hands, the sight of the sun setting over the sea and the railings at the edge of the road broken, the path over the cliff into the ocean open. In a flash, I saw my mother and father standing there, looking out, hands clasped together.

Saddened, the peaceful scene was replaced by the cold white inside of the ambulance. I coruscated in and out of consciousness, each time seeing faces I didn't understand- Mai, Tate, Shizuru… and others I felt I should know. Men in doctor's coats were talking around me when Prof. Sagisawa came in and ushered them out. She talked to me, but I didn't understand what she was talking about. The room changed, became colder, darker, full of tubes and wires and things I don't understand. I felt naked and vulnerable, young, so that I couln't comprehend what was going on.

Through my dreaming, I could feel things going on inside of me- bruises healing, blood pumping, but I was also aware of something else at a molecular level- Shizuru's venom. It had metastasised to my cells, part of my system- my body no longer fought it off. I felt almost as though I had some connection to the villain now, some unspoken and strictly biological bond. It repulsed me beyond anything I had ever felt before. Shizuru was a coldhearted temptress, and as much as my body was weak against both her powers and her charm, my mind remained lucid and disgusted.

"Natsuki."

A voice called at me through my dreams. I thought for a brief moment that it was my mother, rousing me from bed before school when I was small. I could almost smell breakfast downstairs, could feel the shadow of my bed sheets against my skin. Historically I didn't cry, but at that moment I thought I might. Go away, mum. Stop calling for me; you're not here any more. I… I didn't know what to think. Shizuru had said that my parents were dead. I received postcards and cheques from them, but some sickening clod of doubt in my stomach reminded me that this was no proof of their existence. I suddenly wanted to reach from my bed in the apartment for the bedside table and pull out the first edition, signed copy of my dad's travel book that I had been sent two years ago. It smelled like his hands- slightly woody and foreign, but unmistakably Kruger.

"Natsuki." A hand shook my shoulder and I snapped awake, my eyes opening wide in the gloom. Tick-Tock was looking at me quizzically, displaying 11:23. I rolled over, and Nao was shaking me, concerned. "It's half eleven."

I sat up, images of yesterday flashing through my head. Where had I been? After I blacked out, there was an empty void in which I had no idea what had happened. It had almost been a whole day.

"Nao." I said almost breathlessly, looking at her with adoring eyes. She seemed so normal after what had happened. I wanted to reach out and touch her, to make sure she was real. "Thanks for waking me up."

"Yeh, well… I couldn't hear the telly over your snoring."

"Oi!" she laughed and ducked out of the way of my playful slap. "Go back to being a lazy-arse."

"Hypocrite."

"Loser."

"Blah." Nao stuck her tongue out and left me where I was, closing my door. Sighing, I sat up in bed and looked down at myself. I was wearing my nightshirt- I checked underneath and there was no sign that Shizuru had beaten me witless yesterday. An expert hand had stitched even the hydra wounds on my shoulder. Where Shizuru had bitten me yesterday was also patched, painful to the touch and ugly on my face. I made the mental note to put some make-up on it- the only time I could condone the use of that stuff was in these kinds of scenarios. Yes, that's right kids: cover-up is for spots, hickeys and snake-bites.

I got up and dressed, thinking to call Yukino and apologize for not meeting her. Then I had a Lit lecture all afternoon… ugh, I was not in the mood for study.

I looked in my mirror and didn't see myself.

Not like a vampire or anything stupid; it was a simple case of the fact that my eyes were wrong. For as long as I can humanly remember, my eyes have been a never-changing, vivid green that stares back at me with strength of identity. Today, I saw a disconcerting brown-yellow leaking into the iris from the pupil. It wasn't anything of mine, I knew. I blinked, wishing it would go away. No use: it was there to stay. This was all because of Shizuru. I blame Shizuru. All my troubles come from Shizuru. I gritted my teeth to stop tears. Why, just when I get to become a hero, does she have to appear? She was too powerful; too inscrutable- I didn't understand her. It felt as though she was obsessed with sucking all of the fun out of being a hero.

Feeling tired and confused, I left my bedroom and trudged into the kitchen, deciding to make some mayo on toast for lunch. Not the healthiest or most nutritionally balanced of choices, I know, but I was in that kind of mood. I munched my way through three slices of white bread before plonking myself down on the sofa next to Nao. We are so the dream team, sitting at home at midday in our pyjamas watching Jeremy Kyle.

"I don't know how you can eat bird shit on toast." Nao commented as I snatched the remote from her. "I feel nauseous just looking at it."

"Better than the hamster feed you keep in the fridge."

"At least that's healthy."

"If that mulch doesn't look like waste, I'm the Queen of England."

"Don't change the channel!" she hissed as I flicked to News24. "Geez, the father was about to maul the husband."

"And that is enjoyable to watch why?"

"Just is." She shrugged. "I get enough of the news at Uni; watching it at home makes me crazy."

The familiar jingle played over the studio camera panning around. "_Welcome to the news at midday. I'm Akane Soir, standing in for our usual anchor. Today's stories are as follows._"

The screen changed to a shot of the char-grilled building opposite Linden Baum. Police and firefighters were walking around, as well as some private inspectors. "_The incident yesterday on Eighth Street has been investigated by several contracted experts, who are at odds as to the reason for the attack. Deputy Wáng of the Special Forces Unit of Fuuka Police released a statement earlier today._"

Tate appeared on the screen with a hastily set-up lectern, the ruins behind him. "_The police have launched a full inquiry into the happenings yesterday, but a few things are clear. We know from eyewitnesses that three villains perpetrated the attack, which has been one of the most public and destructive so far: the only one identified was a young woman going by the alias of Julia."_ They cut to a blurry close-up of the spider-woman. "_A full alert has been put out to Asgard, who have yet to respond with a statement of their own. Fuuka Police suspects that this was a villainous attempt to kill or capture an anonymous hero in the café opposite the destroyed building, who could not be identified by CCTV footage._"

Well, that was me. I looked over at Nao, who was tense and disapproving beside me. I wondered why.

"_Deputy, does this attack show that villains are willing to be more public and destructive?_" someone asked. Tate shook his head.

"_Historically villains are not this aggressive. I believe that they were desperately after this individual hero for some unknown reason, and that anyone surrounding this individual is in grave danger. I'd advise everyone to re-check their contacts and friends._"

"_Thank you Deputy Wáng._" Akane said, the camera snapping back to the studio. "_In other news, radical anti-hero group Human Identity Preservators' leading force, Kazuya Krau, has launched a row over the state of heroic rights with his exposition of heroity's shortcomings. The paper, which was received by Senator Sergey Wáng this morning, describes and illustrates human deaths and injuries due to heroic malpractice. In all likelihood, the Fuuka Council will dismiss the document, but Mr. Krau is adamant that we don't overlook the damage done to our society by heroity._"

The shot cut to a man in his thirties. He was good-looking but stern, wearing a suit with a blue pin on the lapel, 'HSH' emblazoned on it. I felt angry at him- it stood for 'Heroes, stay hidden', and he was a very bigoted man in my opinion. "_It is up to us, humanity, to actually take into consideration the growing and dangerous sphere of heroic influence on our culture. Though I agree that they do well fighting villains, they also cause a great deal of damage that we often overlook. The council is always strained with repairing buildings and roads destroyed by battles, and we should be diverting these funds towards our own police force. We should be able to deal with villains- not constantly wondering if a hero will come and save us._"

I gritted my teeth and stayed silent.

"Natsuki?"

"What?"

"You're bleeding."

I looked around and saw a flash of red on my shirt. I brought a hand up to my chin; it came back with a smattering of blood. Damn it. I couldn't feel the pain of Shizuru's wounds, even though they'd re-opened. I went into the kitchen to get some kitchen towel and dabbed at the twin puncture wounds, feeling silly and embarrassed. I looked like an idiot, putting plasters on my lower lip, but I suppose that was better than to bleed all over my clothes. Shit, how could I go to my lecture? Takeda didn't talk to me any more, but everyone was bound to wonder where the hell you get wounds like mine.

"Oi! Natsuki!" Nao shouted from the living room.

"What?"

"I found your phone down the back of the sofa! You got a text!"

I grumbled and went over to grab it from her, unlocking it and looking at the text.

**From: (+12) 444 26 2 8928  
To the hero who selfishly caused the destruction of a building, 3 deaths and over forty casualties: H.I.P demands that you remove yourself from society. **

How the hell did they know my phone number?

Ugh, I'm so tired of exams . that chapter took forever.


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: Massive apology for my lack of updates. I actually got to do some amazing work experience in a real hospital and I couldn't pass it up, so writing took the back bench. I'm really sorry but . Thanks to all my lovely reviews, though, for sticking with me. This chapter goes a bit fast, I think. But I re-wrote it so many bloody times that in the end I settled with this. Hope you all enjoy it. End of drabbling nonsense nobody wants to read.

Chapter 7

I sped down the motorway, feeling the cool evening air whistle through cracks in the seal between my helmet and leathers, the road seemingly sucked underneath the wheels of my bike. I saw an old couple look at me scathingly as I passed them in the fast lane, but I'm most reckless and childish when I'm on my bike, leaving the tarmac behind me. I can't help it- driving is always calming and liberating to me, the sort of feeling I actually needed right now.

My junction came up, so I swerved into the left-hand lane, earning an angry horn from the Peugeot behind me. Let him be stressed- I'm chilled. Chilled so much I'm in the fridge. Yeh.

I was actually on the way to nowhere when I realized just how close I was to my parents' house. Should I go? I knew where the spare key was. I could go in, tidy up a bit… but I'd just end up depressed. I decided to at least call my mum's mobile. I hoped she was still using the same one, because Shizuru's taunt was really beginning to get to me.

I veered off the A-road I was following, twisting through tiny backways streets and passing idyllic middle-class houses. I used to be able to name all the people who lived in them, but now I felt cut off from this neighbourhood. I live a very different life- Natsuki Kruger, ex-badass. Now, I'm a boring academic. Well… maybe not so boring when you can shoot condensed bullets of mist out of your hands, but still… I pulled into my driveway. Damn, this was nostalgic, even if the hedge was overgrown and weeds were currently in control of the garden, the quaint little house was very much home.

Mum had been into gnomes- heaven knows why- and kept the spare front door key in the hollow one with the fishing rod. He was perched on top of a gaudy red and white mushroom, which totally reminded me of Mario. I took it out and turned it in the lock, which was rusty from lack of use. So far as I knew, we'd paid off the mortgage, but when they left on their world tour my parents had stopped the gas and electricity for the house, since by that time I'd just moved into my first flat- a horrid one-bedroom sinkhole in downtown Fuuka with mould growing in the toilet. When I thought about it, I could have done better, since my parents were heavily subsidizing my living costs, but I think I wanted to prove something to myself. And plus, I had to save up for my bike.

The porch was damp and covered in spiderwebs, but beyond that, my house was still cozy and innocent as I remembered it. I ran my hand over the dusty surfaces, perhaps a couple of tears leaking out of the corners of my eyes. I couldn't help it- everything seems to have changed so violently since I was a child, including me.

As I went into the kitchen, I heard the upstairs floorboards creek. Weird, because they only creak when someone steps on them. I froze, suddenly very worried. Was there someone in my house? A burglar?

Light steps descended the stairs, like something from a horror movie, and I was rooted to the spot. All right, calm down. I'm a hero. I can handle a human burglar. The steps moved closer, along the hallway, until a shadow was cast on the wall just outside the kitchen.

"Natsuki." The figure said, revealing himself to be Nagi, dressed as usual in his stately, billowing cloak, but he had a book- dad's book- balanced on his head. "Why would you be here of all places?"

"Uh… I don't know. Just felt like visiting." I shrugged (hopefully) nonchalantly under his reddish gaze.

"I see." He looked around. "What a charming domicile."

"What brings you here?"

He chuckled. "I like you. You're not afraid to ask questions. I know where all my heroes are at any time, and I thought I'd come and visit you, since your presence hasn't been felt in Asgard since you ascended. Why is that?"

"I've been… busy."

"Do you know the reason that you were picked in the first place?" He asked triumphantly. "I have coordinated many things, but you were always a loose end. You and your mother."

"What does mum have to do with it?"

"Your mother was one of my most promising. She was a born hero, from a long line of heroes, and yet…" He looked half annoyed, half crestfallen. "And she still betrayed me for a human."

"…My mum was…?"

"One of the best I've ever known. Saeko was as beautiful as she was powerful, but she was… obsessive. A wild card in my perfect deck. And still, I gave her chance after chance…"

"Don't talk about her like that!" I said, fuming. Nagi leered at me, hands in his pockets, radiating power. "She was the best mother she could be to me!"

"People change. People lie. Your mother was very good at both, little hero." He growled. "You have no idea what she tried to do- no, not even that. What she'd already done by the time she died. You know what she'd made? You."

Me? What was he on about! The revelation that my mum had been a hero was shocking, but why did he keep going on about lies and changes and betrayal? "Of course she made me. She was my mother."

He pulled out a necklace he was wearing- a slim sliver chain, and dangled its centerpiece before my eyes. "This is a vial of Saeko Kruger's blood. Do you know what it does?"

"No."

"Drink it, and any hero will become human. Irreversibly. The whole of our race could be rendered powerless in days. She had been developing it for years, testing the 'cure' on herself- all she ever wanted to be was human. And when she perfected it, she got married and had a child, who she thought would not inherit the 'cure'."

"…Me."

"Correct."

"But… surely if I inherited it, I'd be human even after you turned hero, since my blood would fight the… whatever."

"Wrong." He grinned, his white hair luminescent in the moonlight from the windows. "The two genes bind together, creating something much worse than a hero. You, Natsuki Kruger, you are the most dangerous person on this planet. A danger to me, especially. I rule Asgard because I can 'turn people into heroes', which is a lie in itself. If any power were to usurp mine, we'd return to chaos, at which point villains would overrule us."

"Why am I dangerous? I'm pretty normal." That sounded off even as I said it. Why this, now? Why me? I just wanted to be normal- well, as normal as I could be. Special was for high-schoolers looking for attention. I just wanted to live my life… I didn't have cast iron plan, but at one point I wanted to settle down. Find love. All those childish notions that we grow up on, playing mummies and daddies in the plastic house in the local park, drawing pictures in the sandpit- everything we work for, I thought I wanted. Not this.

Nagi took the book off his head and held it at arm's length. The author's picture of my dad on the back struck me like an arrow to the heart. "You could destroy everything I've worked for over forty years. All security in the world. Some humans are born to be heroes; they just need a push in the right direction from me. You, though- you could prevent the next generation of heroity."

"I wouldn't do that."

"Of course not." He dismissed me. "You are the daughter of Saeko Kruger. You have the same sense of justice as her… but you needn't do anything willingly. Not from a villainous perspective."

"Oh." I realized. "So, villains could… use me, to turn all heroes into humans, and therefore rule the world. Properly."

"Exactly. I had hoped that they hadn't discovered Saeko's research, but Rad is always five steps ahead of everybody else. That bastard." The cussword sounded wrong coming from someone with the body of a child. "He let me change you, knowing full well the effect it would have. And now he'll be after you and your mother's legacy. It's not safe."

What had my mum done?

I couldn't help but think of her, for a moment, as selfish. Selfish to develop the cure, and selfish to use it on herself without definitely knowing she wouldn't pass it to me… selfish for giving up heroism to be with dad. But… she only wanted a normal life. How could you begrudge her that?

I remembered my blackout after Shizuru had poisoned me. Had… had they done something? Taken my blood to use in effectively neutering heroes' powers? I shivered even in my leathers, thinking of that dream. Was that my destiny? To either stay cooped up under heavy protection or to lie strapped to a table, being sucked dry by villains? I would not have either, thank you very much. Last time I checked, 'Natsuki' was not an anagram of 'victim'.

"You understand?" Nagi asked. "If I were less of a gentleman, I'd have killed you as soon as possible, but I believe you have your uses."

"Oh, great."

"Villains are also heroes. We just give them another name. I believe we can play their own card against them, to go back to my analogy. I have given you your grace period to get used to being a hero. Now, you have to work for your power."

"I don't get it. Surely if you neuter villains, more will rise to take their places."

"Incorrect. You see, heroism is inherited on a dominant gene. Theoretically, each child of a hero-human pairing had a fifty percent chance of gaining powers naturally. The others, who did not inherit the gene, still have dormant heroism inside them. These-" he gestured to the gems on his jacket, "Merely contain the dominant H gene that awakens those powers."

"Are there a finite number of those?"

"No, I make more every couple of hundred years."

My heart skipped a beat. So old. It should be impossible. Heroes may fly in the skies, but everybody dies. His expression was one that said 'and if you're impressed with that, wait until you see my…'. Apparently, I looked shocked. "Yes. I am quite old."

"That's an understatement, like saying that the cookie monster just _likes_ cookies."

"I'll pretend to know what you're talking about." Nagi said, looking a little confused. "Natsuki… please, for all our sakes, be careful."

"I can't promise anything."

"I know." He bowed slightly and tucked the vial of my mother's blood back under his shirt. "Still, If anything were to happen, Natsuki, I would not hesitate to kill you."

Great.

I sat; fat and unmoving like some kind of resplendent bagpuss on the sofa, staring numbly into an empty tub of ice cream, the World Cup on telly. I wasn't really paying attention, since I'm not into football, but anything to take my mind off what Nagi had said. It was dark outside, August having relented to September, and I was down way lower than I'd ever been before. My eyes reflected my mood, almost wholly taken up by the brownish-yellow that Shizuru had stained them. If I continued this way, I'd gain weight. Nao had started buying low-fat ice cream.

Speaking of Nao, she was cooking dinner at the moment, a stir-fry that filled the otherwise musty flat with the rich scent of soy and vegetables, making my stomach rumble. Thank god for small mercies and flatmates.

The doorbell rang but I didn't get up; Nao would answer it, I decided. Dutifully, she did, and I heard the low murmur of conversation. She led the caller in. "Nat, it's someone for you from the paper… What did you say your name was?"

"Fujino."

My blood froze in my veins at that voice.

"Well, come on in then. She says you two were going to do an interview? Natsuki? Oi, space-case, wake up!" Nao clicked her fingers. "Stop staring at stupid men in shorts and do whatever you arranged."

Shizuru gracefully came into view, dressed modestly, carrying a briefcase and wearing a coat. She smiled sweetly at Nao, who excused herself back to the kitchen. "I'll cook for three, if you want, Ms. Fujino?"

"I wouldn't want to impede on your kindness," she replied. "But supper smells delicious. I would be very much honoured."

She sat down on the armchair, which was at an angle to the sofa. Usually, since it was only me and Nao living here, we shared the settee, but Nao'd seen the armchair very cheap and so had bought it anyway. Shizuru crossed her legs, pulling out a tape recorder and a pad of paper. "Good evening, Natsuki."

I gritted my teeth, careful not to re-open the healing wounds on my lower lip. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Not so loud, lest your flatmate hear, ne?"

I lowered my voice, glaring at her through narrow eyes. "What the hell did you do to me?"

"Something I rather regret. I do miss the brilliant green of Natsuki's eyes."

"Cut the crap."

She shifted in her seat, remaining playful, but now slightly businesslike. "I am not here to hurt you. My comrades would like to, but I hold significant power amongst villains. Second only to Lord Rad."

"If you're not going to hurt me, tell me what you did last week after Linden Baum." I demanded.

"I was accompanied by someone who reports directly to Rad. I could not go against his wishes."

"Tell me."

"We took a blood sample. Nothing extraordinary."

"Just that?" She nodded. "What has your poison done to me? How are you connected to the hydra in Asgard's sewers?"

"Ara… Natsuki asks so many questions." She tutted. "It would be unfair of me to divulge too much of my own information without you doing the same, yes?"

"It would be a shame for me to shoot your face off."

"How crass." Shizuru sat back in the armchair, at ease and still overpowering me with her presence. The way she moved- her mien, her voice, everything added to a person so confident that I couldn't understand her. How could you never have any moral doubts or developments? How could an individual be so set in their ways that nothing anybody else said or did could cause them to lose assurance in theirself? "Natsuki does not seem to fully appreciate her position."

I frowned. If I kept doing this, I'd get worry lines. "Why do you keep referring to me in the third person?"

"Just one of my little idiosyncrasies." Score one for the Literature freaks. Shizuru smiled, knowing I'd clicked.

"I know what's happening." I said tensely, thinking that Shizuru's eyes were the same colour as the blood in Nagi's vial. My mum's blood. My blood. "And I know where I stand."

"Do you now?"

"Yes."

"Then you know that both heroity and villainy fear and despise you. You mean destruction for us all. I wouldn't be surprised if assassination attempts are forthcoming."

What was she getting at? "So?"

"I fought you. Yes, you have great power. However, you lack any formal training whatsoever. You are fodder for any superbeing who wants rid of you."

"And? I don't see where this is going."

"I'd like to offer my skills. To train you."

"…Are you shitting in my cornflakes?"

"I will pretend Natsuki did not just say that." Shizuru said exasperatedly. "I stand by my offer."

"Why the hell should I trust you!" I hissed under my voice as the sound of sizzling noodles quieted, indicating that Nao was finishing supper. "You're a heartless villain."

"Ara, very interesting. So, you'd say that many university students are uninterested in politics, then?" She completely changed the subject as Nao emerged from the kitchen with three plates of stir-fry. "Ah, Ms. Zhang. Thank you so much."

"Nao is fine." She said, setting the food and accompanying chopsticks down. "So, Miss Fujino… what brings you here, of all places?" she asked politely. Too politely.

"I have covered many aspects of the struggles in my work, but not yet the effect of heroes and villains on education. Natsuki and I met at a coffee shop quite a while ago; she seemed a very learned and intelligent individual. I thought to use her for my article."

"I see." Nao said. We ate in slightly stilted silence, shoveling stir-fry into our mouths with reckless speed. I nearly choked, but the thought of receiving the Heimlich maneuver from either of the women opposite me made me go red and stare balefully at a limp noodle that was scrambling out of the side of my bowl. Poor guy. I gobbled him up anyway.

"I'm going to grab a drink. Want a tin?"

"Uh, go on." Nao left into the kitchen to get beer.

"Drinking will only lower your inhibitions." Shizuru warned me. "And heroes with lower inhibitions tend to make bigger messes than humans."

"So?"

"What a great sense of duty Natsuki has. Are you sure you're Saeko's daughter?"

"Shut up. Of course I am."

"Then believe me when I say that you should trust me."

This confirmed that she was barmy. "Shizuru, I have about as much of a reason to trust you as a dog has to practice tai chi."

She narrowed her eyes, briefly pausing to skewer a prawn with one of her chopsticks. "This is not a 'who can make the silliest analogy' contest, Natsuki. This is life and death."

"Then _why the hell are you offering to _help _me_?"

The older woman averted her gaze for the first time and looking just a little human. Only a little. "I… I'm unsure. It feels like the right thing to do."

I laughed out loud, prompting Nao to come back out and place a can of beer on the table. "I'm going into my room now, to leave you two to get on with your interview."

"Cya." She sauntered off; looking over her shoulder at Shizuru in a way I could swear was so very bloody familiar. I turned back to the villain, my knuckles white on my lap. "The right thing to do? You wouldn't know right from David Beckham."

"Who?"

"Exactly." I said triumphantly. "He's a footballer, by the way."

"What an excellent but nevertheless useless piece of information." Shizuru replied scathingly, setting her chopsticks down. "Natsuki does not quite grasp just how dangerous a position she's in."

"Pssh." I waved her off, putting on a confident front. "You honestly expect that some psycho is going to come to my flat? Sorry, but there's already one here at the moment."

She clenched her teeth, visibly straining against my barrage of abuse. "Very well. If Natsuki wishes to subject herself to a painful death, I will not interfere."

She stood, a storm of emotion and unfathomable power swirling like a maelstrom behind her burgundy eyes. She picked up her briefcase and promptly left, closing the door with a faint click behind her. Shame, I hadn't gotten to the joke about video games yet.

I sighed and sat back on the sofa, prawn stir-fry partying in my stomach. I was worried. Of course I was bloody worried. My life is in danger, if I trust what Nagi and Shizuru say. Can I, though? If you can't trust the lord of heroes, who is there left?

Tate. I need to call Tate.

Several things in my life are not particularly spiffing, but of all of them, my social life seems to have suffered most. I'm twenty-two, and I haven't been to a party in months. How depressing is that?

The Deputy came around the corner, wearing (smartly) a coat to cover his uniform. Cops attract a lot of interest in Fuuka these days. He looked tired, I decided, with more bags under his eyes than Nao accrues after a day out at the mall. His hair was the same ridiculous blonde as ever, but it seemed to droop today. It seems we all have the September blues.

"Natsuki." He greeted me. We were at our 'favourite' bus stop, since it's not that far from me and not that out of the way for him either. "There better be a damn good reason you want to see me on my day off."

"I assure you, there is." I replied, gesturing for him to follow me. It was just starting to drizzle, so I decided to go to a bar, the same one, incidentally, as I got drunk at the night I got nicked by Diana. Why was that so long ago? It was full of grotty alcoholic old men, but a few broken noses later they all knew to stay well away from me. We went in and I was immediately comforted by the gloom and the smell of whiskey. It seemed very… recognisable. We sat down, far far away from the bar, with a little booth to ourselves. In a brief moment of insanity, I noted there was no tablecloth to hide my identity if we got attacked. Shame.

"So?" He asked, looking around nervously. Obviously, these were the kind of pubs he shut down, rather than drank at.

I took a small sheaf of papers out of my bag and gave them to him to look over. His eyes went from bored to wow to holy shit in thirty seconds flat, as his mouth gaped ungainly. He rather reminded me of Takeda when I wore short skirts. All men are the same.

"Natsuki… are you sure?"

"Positive."

"Will you testify in front of a court?" He looked worried. "This will make you rather unpopular."

"I know." I said, wishing I had something else to say. I fiddled with the ends of my hair instead. "But on top of that, I have some other news."

"What could be quite as shocking as this?"

In answer, I flicked my wrist in such a way that caused my hand to issue a plume of mist, cocking my imaginary gun and dropping small blue bullets out of nowhere onto the table.

"Tell me that was a parlour trick." He lost his tan immediately.

"Nope." I replied, looking around. It was, like, mid-morning, and we were out of sight of the bar, so I was pretty confident about not being seen. My abilities are cool, but I feel uncomfortable using them because I always feel like a villain. And look the part, too. How many cats in trees want to be saved by a woman in biking leathers with icy mist crawling out of her glowing green eyes? My point exactly. It was problematic, this hero thing. I'd a a nightmare about my Lit final and woken up to a room covered in fog and about -10 degrees. Maybe Shizuru was a little bit right. I needed to learn some control.

"Shit." That was the first time I'd heard him swear. "Shit, Natsuki."

"Deep in it."

He scratched his chin as I normalized, feeling dirty somehow. "I can see why you want this. But… damn. We have hero consultants, like Diana, but for you to actually work and be under the protection of the city. I'd have to ask-"

"No you don't." I cut him off. "Nobody has to know but me and you, Tate. I don't care what work it is- desk job, toilet mopping, whatever, but I need the protection."

Ah, now he was frowning. How long has it been since I saw that beautifully hairy furrowed brow? "The job I could secure, but the other thing? Impossible, if what you tell me is true."

"Why!" I hissed, getting upset. "She's just a person."

"She's a villain! We have enough trouble getting minor ones in while they're under their real identities. To get one who has not even a smudge on her public record in court, and to then win the case… you'd need a miracle."

"How sure are you that it's a no-go?"

"Ninety-nine point nine nine recurring." He replied confidently. "It's a folly, Natsuki. Be realistic."

"Humans and heroes have different meanings of that word." I retorted. "I've seen crazy shit since that night, Tate. Things that would give you nightmares every minute of your sleep."

"Nao in her underwear?"

You've got to admit, that was a good one. I half-smiled, glad he still had his sense of humour. "Thank you, Tate."

"We haven't negotiated anything yet!" He said desperately, as I started to rise. "Damn, Natsuki, sit your leather-clad ass down and listen for once."

"I study History and Literature, Tate;I do a hell of a lot of listening."

"Not the point."

"Make yours, then."

He looked over the file again, wearing a thinking face. "Well, I'll assume you're safe at home, and I'm not wasting men guarding you. No offence. So I'll make up a job for you, but I don't know what it'll be. Spefo is always understaffed, but you have no police training. I suppose we could forge some records?"

"That would be appreciated."

"This feels so wrong." Tate mourned his integrity as it wafted away. "So be even planning to forge documents, especially as a police deputy."

"Man up."

"Whatever. Anyway, this protection is a big ask. I'll expect you to actually work."

"How much?"

"Minimum wage."

"What!" I said, appalled. "That's bullshit."

"You're not in a bargaining position. From what you've given me, I can see that you don't want to be the property of the villains, nor the proverbial captive of your own Asgard. Spefo are the only alternative with enough manpower and resources to protect you properly. Even Rad wouldn't move against you if he knew he'd incur the wrath of Spefo."

"Exactly. From what I know, he doesn't behave that way." I mused, agreeing with Tate. "Well, you have my number. Give me some details when you've got everything sorted."

I moved to stand up again, but Tate protested. "Natsuki."

"That's my name, don't take it in vain." I replied, agitated, sitting back down with a resigned _pflumph_ on the plush seat. "What, Tate?"

Worry etched lined beyond his years on his young face. "This will sound odd, but… Can we trust you?"

"You're right, it does."

"Not to hurt your pride, but with dual loyalties flying around everywhere… it's difficult to know who to trust."

"You can, Tate. At the moment, at least, I'm only interested in saving my own skin; once I no longer fear violent abduction, I can focus on others. Not before."

"That doesn't sound very hero-ish."

With the weight of my situation, I didn't feel very hero-ish either.


End file.
